Firearms Amnesty

The Hon. T.J. STEPHENS (15:09): I have a supplementary, and thank you for that answer, minister. You spoke about the amnesty: can you also confirm that when firearms are handed in with amnesty to be destroyed the mechanism is there to have them cross-checked, to make sure that they are not just destroyed but that they are taken off the missing firearms register if, in fact, they are some of those missing firearms?

The Hon. P. MALINAUSKAS (Minister for Police, Minister for Correctional Services, Minister for Emergency Services, Minister for Road Safety) (15:09): I had some statistics on my phone that might have been able to enlighten the honourable member, but I would rather make sure they are absolutely correct before I pass them on publicly.

I am happy to again take that question on notice but, as I understand it, the gun amnesty has proven rather successful thus far, which is why we would like to see this continue. There are a number of options that are before the authorities regarding how they apply the amnesty, as I understand it. In terms of specifically how, if a gun isn't going through the legitimisation process which, ultimately, should result in that firearm going back in the hands of a fully licensed owner, and exactly what takes place I am happy to find that out and again take that on notice.

I have also undertaken in this place previously a commitment to the Hon. Mr Stephens regarding keeping him informed around potential investments being made around the IT system that applies within firearms. That is something that this government is still actively pursuing. Again, I am happy to restate my commitment to Mr Stephens around that, because the more I become familiar with the way firearms regulation works in South Australia the more it becomes obvious that there is a need to upgrade the IT system within SAPOL and be able to provide investment to achieve that end which allows greater tracking and would be able to provide more expedient numbers and answers to the sort of questions that you are asking.

Nevertheless, that being said, even with the current regime and IT system in place, SAPOL are able to extract a large amount of information. Your more recent supplementary question is more of a procedural nature, and I imagine I should be able to get an answer relatively quickly for the honourable member.