A Queensland Police Service Commissioner’s report has recommended the role of the state’s beleaguered Weapons Licensing Group be transferred away from the police to a separate government department — potentially Titles Queensland.
The Commissioner’s 100-Day Review of the Queensland Police Service Final Report outlines a host of issues across the entire Queensland Police Service, with a section devoted to Weapons Licensing that notes “despite more than 30 internal and external reviews of the capability since 1998, weapons licensing activities continue to impose a significant operational burden on QPS”.
The report goes on to note many of the deficiencies identified in previous audits remain unresolved, and Weapons Licensing Group (WLG) still does not have adequate staff.
“The Weapons Licensing Group relies on a hybrid of online and paper-based systems,” the report says.
“Manual data entry, primarily performed by AO3 administrative staff with limited role flexibility, is extremely labour intensive.
“The limitations of the Weapons Licensing Management System have led to severe backlogs, sector and stakeholder concerns, and numerous public complaints.
“These issues have implications for the administration and management of the Queensland Police Register, which is linked to the mandated National Firearms Database.”
One proposed solution is creating a dedicated Firearms Act covering licensing and administration matters, while amending the Weapons Act to focus on enforcement matters – which would, the report says, “enable structural reform while preserving police oversight of enforcement and public safety”.
It says Titles Queensland, owned by the Queensland State Government via the Queensland Investment Corporation and responsible for overseeing the State Land Registry and performing property valuations, had expressed interest in taking over the Queensland Firearms Registry, “drawing on its experience with land and water registries.”
The proposal to move Weapons Licensing Group roles to a non-police administration department has the wholehearted support of Shooters Union Australia, with president Graham Park saying the organisation had been calling for the change for years.
“Police should be focused on front-line public safety issues, not dealing with administrative matters — especially not issues as complex as our firearms legislation,” he said.
“A huge number — arguably the majority — of issues with Weapons Licensing Group have come about because someone there has decided to basically implement new rules via policy, such as suddenly deciding everyone wanting a centrefire rifle needs to provide a ton of totally unnecessary information such as copies of the competition rules for the match they plan to shoot.
“Permit to Acquire timeframes have blown out from a couple of days to over a fortnight, for something that should be more or less instant thanks to computer systems.
“Pretty much every ministerial meeting we have involving WLG has them explaining how busy and stressed out they are, while ignoring they’re creating most of their own problems via their arbitrary and inconsistent internal policies.”
There was clear evidence from other states that moving firearms licensing and permits to a civilian administration would have considerable efficiency benefits while still ensuring proper oversight of who legally has access to firearms, Mr Park said.
“New South Wales moved a lot of the administration side of its firearms licensing and permit-to-acquire processes to Services NSW, the same people who handle driver licensing and vehicle registration, and the member complaints we were receiving about the NSW Firearms Registry dropped almost overnight,” he said.
“The police don’t need to be issuing drivers licences or registering vehicles, so handing that responsibility to the Department of Transport was seen as a no-brainer.
“There’s no reason the same approach can’t be taken with firearms licensing too.”
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