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Statistics on guns incorrect, misleading
Editor, The Recorder,
Wow, those are some compelling statistics concerning the recent gun ownership laws in Australia cited by both Roy Gutshall and Iris Hooke. Unfortunately, they are a prime example of the old adage, "Figures don't lie, but liars figure."
In this case, both writers state that the Australian law banning guns is about a year old. In reality, the law was enacted in 1997. Furthermore, the writers imply that much of Australia's citizenry owned personal firearms before their ownership was made illegal and their guns collected by the government. This also is untrue.
Australian citizens do not, and never did have, a constitutional right to own firearms. Even before the 1997 law, handgun ownership in Australia was limited to approved sporting clubs, hunters and collectors. The 1997 law did not take away all guns owned by these groups; only some types of firearms (primarily semi-automatic and pumpaction weapons). And even with the ban in effect, those who can demonstrate a legitimate need to possess prohibited categories of firearms can petition the government for exemptions from the law.
Based on the foregoing, any claims based on statistics which try to show a cause and effect relationship between the gun buyback and increased crime rates are suspect, since the average Australian citizen didn't own firearms before the buyback. But beyond that, the statistics cited by the letter writers are outdated and based on only the first year results. Long term trends need to be used to draw valid conclusions. For instance, the statistic cited about homicides being up 3.2 percent only reflects the absolute number of homicides rather than the homicide rate. In actuality, the homicide rate in Australia since the enactment of the buy-back has changed little over the past decade and has actually dipped slightly since 1997.
The writers also cite with alarm statistics from the state of Victoria, "where homicides are now up 300 percent." This is a prime example of how misleading statistics can be when overall numbers are not provided.
Victoria is a state with a population of 4.5 million people. In 1996, it experienced a total of seven firearm-related homicides and 19 firearm-related deaths in 1997 (an increase of 171 percent, not 300 percent) but statistically an insignificant increase in a population of 4.5 million. In terms of trends since 1997, the percentage of homicides committed with firearms in Victoria has actually decreased. Also, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the proportion of armed robberies involving firearms has decreased from 24.1 percent in 1997 to 14 percent by 2000.
I'm not pointing out the writer's statistical errors to argue for or against gun control. Rather I wish to point out that readers shouldn't judge the success or failure of a program from small, mixed bag, short term statistics. In any case, whatever the outcome of that analysis, the results aren't necessarily applicable here in the USA, where laws regarding gun ownership are (and always have been) much different from those in Australia.
Larry Held
Monterey, Va.
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