NZ firearm laws
This is an updating blog on the firearms regime in NZ.
Thinking of getting a gun license in NZ, you may like to read it.
26-2-26
Advice fron COLFO New Zealand https://www.colfo.org/arms-bill-signup can assist preparing submissions for the arms act reform, deadline: 11.59 pm on Monday, 16 February 2026
Short verion example provided by COLFO;
"I
support a return to the principle that licensed firearm owners remain
innocent until proven guilty. Remove any provisions for pre-emptive
restrictions or penalties based on unproven claims. Treat licensed
owners as responsible citizens unless culpability is established beyond
reasonable doubt in court. Place the burden of proving non-compliance
solely on prosecuting authorities. This approach eliminates presumptions
against owners and requires substantiated evidence, protecting
individual rights in proceedings.
Rewrite the General Policy Statement to state: "The New Zealand firearms
regulatory system grants individuals considered 'fit and proper' the
right to possess arms items, subject to safeguards." This wording
recognises all qualifying New Zealanders' entitlement to own firearms
once licensed. It acknowledges firearms' historical cultural role and
normalises legal ownership.
I oppose
limits on the number of firearms or ammunition licensed holders may
own. Such restrictions fail to enhance public safety. Vetted individuals
pose equal risk with multiple items as with one. Criminals ignore laws
and acquire firearms illegally so further restrictions on the
law-abiding make no discernible impact on public safety. The registry
holds licensed owners accountable for each registered item.
Assess all proposed changes increasing burdens on the regulator or
licensed community by asking: Does this meaningfully improve public
safety? Provide evidence to support any affirmative answer and reject
unclear changes until objective evidence emerges.
I support standardising magazine capacity at 10 rounds for A-category
firearms. This balances safety with utility for hunting, sport, and
animal control.
I support reintroducing autoloading hunting rifles without large-capacity detachable magazines. These equip licensed hunters to aid conservation against invasive species like goats, pigs, and deer. Bolt-action rifles allow engagement of one or two animals in a group, but autoloading models double this, benefiting the environment. These rifles suit hunting with slower reloads, unlike military-style semi-automatics."
For fair legal advice regarding firearm issues you are best to seek advice from lawyers.
Contact COLFO lawyers Franks Ogilvie
Wakefield House
90 The Terrace
Wellington 6011
The Terrace
Wellington 6143
Despite evidence of firearm storage correctly carried out according to the regulations written description of the Arms Act including witnesses and images of the firearm storage provided to the "Firearm Safety Authority", both police and FSA adamantly ignored the facts claimed they relied on the following policeman's statement as expertise for firearm seizure and license revoked; “I am not familiar with the requirements around storage of firearms however this did not appear to be adequate.”
Summarized as whatever a whim of the day for an untrained and uninformed NZ cop is acceptable according to the Arms Act for the FSA to carry out seizures and revoke licenses.
Following is a recent history that caused voters to support the ACT party revision of the act.
An Act party Survey of licensed firearm owners (LFO's) collected from the ACT party Fair Firearms Law questionnaire
reported a dismal score for NZ police handling of LFO's at 1.5 / 10
reflecting the deep set of police created systemic failures summarized
here.
In court, Colfo's lawyer Jack Hodder Kings Council said gun and ammunition owners' property rights had been "extinguished".
"All the property rights of value are gone.
Nicole McKee ACT party NZ December 2025 announced ACT Party re-revised election promised arms act replacement, Watered down from cancelling the registration and semi autos available again, she did request this to be included but was turned away by National and NZ First.
Coincidentally the Bondi massacre occured in Australia and among top of the web search news on it is of course Australian PM and Labour/Green coalition calls for more gun laws immediately and it's no time to discuss it so grab a new packet of crayons to write them up the same as they did in NZ. It is a prepetual cycle and political scapegoating one of humanity's oldest professions,
The hero of the day at Bondi is a Syrian ex Assad policeman bravely grabbing the gun off one of the ISIS inspired terrorists reflecting the recent history in Syria on Australian soil.
PM Albanese new laws do not include a simple thing about vetting migrants more and ASIO communicating the observed terrorists activities to police but did say that non citizens can't get a license. Yet another blanket ban. So the Englishman and keen hunter newly arrived and wanting to carry out his traditional activity of hunting deer cannot become licensed.
So this is the typical repeating pattern of rushed gun laws and the present McKee driven revision is only a reprieve unless gun owners decide wake up and actively vote to ban the crayon approach to law creation.
NZ Herald;
Initially Albanese said there was no evidence the father and son gunmen who opened fire in a deadly terror attack on Bondi Beach had been radicalised.
Speaking to 7.30 host Sarah Ferguson on Monday night, Albanese responded to questions about whether ASIO (Australian Security Intelligence Organisation) should have honed in on the pair’s radical ideology after the younger one was first flagged by the intelligence agency in October 2019."
When disaster hits and a verified link that proves inactivity they will prefer to blame something else. Scapegoating
Video of New South Wales gun laws, the Green party is aiming for one single shot only. Humane follow up shots are not uncommon, a follow up shot in the bush on a moving deer is a matter of if deer is visible moving between vegetation gaps before quickly disappearing from sight leading to a prolonged blood trail hunt. A single shot is a slow reload making the less humane blood trail automatic.
A one point they had banned belt worn ammo holders
Which were banned in the new Aussie law due to the terrorists were witnessed with belt ammo holders and reloading from them, confusing enough polititians thinking they had belt fed guns. However it has now been reversed after they gave it a bit more thought.
Was not long ago the NZ firearm owners chided Australians over their draconian gun laws, and now NZ gun owners suffer under those laws and do not think for one moment they are not serious about single shots and they are not serious about making that law.
Along with the gun restrictions they have restricted freedom of speech which affects a larger portion of the poplulation and currently the Australian One Nation Party is polling higher than the Liberals for the first time in history.
Further they also want to extend 3D printers into the gun laws, so includes geeks into warrantless searches. Not good for proprietory designs when a Cop turns up and snatches the computor. Patent's cannot be disclosed until filed and made pulblic.
3D printers and AI is the future of engineering and businesses develop products. NZ biggest achievement was only recently with Rocket Lab a company that proudly boasts 3D printing got it to where it is today.
NZ Herald 23/2/26
An Auckland woman says she was left frustrated when police didn’t arrive to help after a man began smashing up her car at a petrol station.
The incident occurred at the self‑serve U-GO on Hillsborough Rd in Mount Roskill around 3.55pm on Monday.
Hope Tamihna, 28, said she had just pulled up at the petrol station when a shirtless man jumped into her vehicle and began demanding money.
“I tried to get out, and he’s trying to pull my bag off me, and I ripped my bag back off him. He grabbed my clothes as I was trying to jump out of the car,” she said.
Tamihna said she moved away from the man, but he then began attacking her car with a wine bottle, smashing the windshield and damaging the exterior, at which point she began filming him.
“He left, and then he came back with a rock and kept smashing the car,” she said.
Tamihna said she called the police, but despite waiting for two hours they never arrived.
She then received a text from police that said the incident had been reassessed and “no longer meets the threshold for emergency attendance”. She was told to lodge a report online instead.
Inspector Stefan Sagar confirmed they received the emergency 111 call, and that “police gathered initial details and confirmed extensive damage to the vehicle”.
However, “at the time the call was made, police were advised that the offender had already fled on foot from the scene,” Sagar said, and police were unable to obtain the informant’s identity at the time, despite several call backs and a follow up text message.
“Based on the information available, there was no indication of ongoing risk and no further information to progress any investigation,” he said. “Given other priority demands taking place, a unit was not dispatched to this call.”
He said two hours after the initial 111 call, the event was reassessed and was recategorised from emergency attendance to non-urgent.
“The complainant was advised of this via text message. The incident was therefore closed with advice for the informant to submit a report via 105,” Sagar said.
That was an unacceptable response to the situation, Tamihna said. She wanted to discuss the incident with police at the scene.
“Nobody came and helped, and I want to press charges against this guy. My kids and I have no transport now,” Tamihna said. “This man is gonna pay me for the damages.”
A spokesperson for U‑GO Hillsborough Rd said as it was an automated self‑serve site, there were no staff located on-site, and directed inquiries to police. “We would fully support any investigation they lead,” the spokesperson added.
They can't maintain the currently laws and polititians want to add more.
We had 2 concrete saws costing over $5000 stolen and Taupo police paid zero interest.
McKee includes storage of firearms may now be at approved places other than a home owned by the license holder a very difficult idea as many rent. I will try and explain it...As a work around to this draconian red tape idea the guns of the renter or friend for storage were recorded on the license of the home owner and this exemplifies the way polititains create laws and cops happily follow them extending to creatively re-imagine them. Dog registration is more precise and simple. It is as if gun owners are the adversary and scapegoats for Christchurch shooter. So quite simply Mckee has returned registration back to the firearm owner.
McKee also Includes discussions of improving the present sale process for guns outside of shops through trademe etc.. To contact the police firearms team on the phone it may be hours of waiting according to reports and inspections are definitely a prolonged wait.
There is an extensive list of threads on those topics here; https://www.nzhuntingandshooting.co.nz/f65/
Further McKee will also remove 15 police employed as a kangaroo style judge for revoking fireams licenses and will be replaced by a smaller independant council importantly including a lawyer to consider the law in fair terms instead of the hammer and prosecute them all approach.
An example, those police had been using non firearms related offences as a basis to revoke firearms licenses and that basis is not on sound legal ground, including trespass when anyone can trespass anyone without a reason and domestic history which are not immune from acrimony and the cops include complaints be they true or not.
Police reversed changes former Deputy Police Commissioner Jevon McSkimming instructed staff to make to the firearms vetting process.
RNZ earlier revealed McSkimming advised the alteration after he was contacted by an acquaintance who told him they would lose their firearms licence if they got any more driving demerit points.
Demerit points will be deducted via a vehicle registered to a person by another person driving the vehicle past a speed camera.
Police Commissioner Richard Chambers said he was of the view "better judgement could have been exercised and a more robust process followed" by McSkimming.
Since then police decided to revert back to using traffic offences to revoke firearm licenses.
ends.
Police officers throughout the country were involved in falsifying alcohol breath tests.
RNZ earlier revealed about 120 staff were under investigation after 30,000 alcohol breath tests were "falsely or erroneously recorded".
The falsified results were only discovered after police built a new algorithm to analyse the data, as the devices themselves could not distinguish between legitimate and illegitimate tests.
ends
NZ Herald.
Discovered after an internal employment process grievance.
A worker at the Firearms Safety Authority claimed she had been asked to do things that were "completely against the Policing Act, employment law and the Public Service Act".
She claimed this included covering up an affair between a senior and junior staff member and helping to ensure a favoured contractor got a job even though they weren't the best candidate.
RNZ earlier revealed a comprehensive review of the police agency had begun following concerns over its workplace culture, including intimate relationships as well as financial practices.
The executive director of the Firearms Safety Authority says she believes she's been "targeted" by police leadership, including the police commissioner, and says her reputation is now "shit".
In an exclusive interview with RNZ, Angela Brazier says she's "pissed off" with police for not publicly backing her over what she has labelled as "unsubstantiated" allegations against her.
"Law experts and gun owners are genuinely concerned over police use of warrant less search powers.
On New Year's Eve, police used the Search and Surveillance Act to conduct a warrant-less search of the Christchurch home of an anti-government, pro-gun pastor Carl Bromley to seize his gun and ammunition. Police said they had received concerns about a person’s well being.
With no warrant required by using section 18 of the act, officers “ransacked” his home and took his rifle, 500 rounds of ammunition and firearms parts. Bromley has not yet received his gun back from police.
Bromley said he had made no threat with his firearms, felt police violated his privacy and were overly forceful. He questioned whether the search was lawful.
In September, 81-year-old antique gun collector Robert Keenan had 110 guns confiscated along with his licence after police suspected he was supplying guns to gang members.
Before Christmas police wrote to Keenan's lawyer confirming he was not a threat and that he could have his guns back, but said they were concerned his home could be targeted by organised criminal gangs.
But Keenan had died, never knowing his license was being returned.
Keenan’s lawyer, firearms specialist Nicholas Taylor, said he had submitted legal letters for at least 12 firearms license owners after similar raids over the last year, winning the return of weapons for each because there were no legal grounds to remove them.
Taylor said many of the police searches were of elderly men, who lived alone, and he believed it was a trend.
A police spokesperson said: “I can tell you definitively that police do not have a policy targeting older gun owners.”
Taylor said he wanted an independent authority to investigate which gun owners warranted home searches by police, as such raids could amount to a breach of privacy and the Bill of Rights.
“Police are not particularly great administrators, and why should they be. We need an independent authority overlooking these.”
The Search and Surveillance Act 2012 allows police to conduct warrant-less searches if they suspect a gun license owner is of danger to themselves or the community.
A police officer in charge of a search can seek permission from an issuing officer either in person, over the phone, or by email.
An issuing officer is authorized by the attorney-general, who can approve any Justice of the Peace, community magistrate, registrar, deputy registrar or other person to act as an issuing officer.
The law allows police to move quickly and initiate and conduct such searches without the oversight of the court.
Christchurch criminal lawyer Anselm Williams said firearms law changes had not made it easier for police to conduct warrant-less searches, but police were taking more interest in gun owners since the 2019 terror attack.
“There is no requirement that the court even know that a search is going to be conducted or has been conducted.”
These powers mean there was risk of putting fit gun owners through unlawful property searches or firearms confiscations, he said.
While police needed to be allowed to do their job, the public also needed to be satisfied they were doing it properly and within the law, he said.
“In cases where a search has been conducted unlawfully, those involved should be held to account.”
There are about 250,000 firearms licensed gun owners in New Zealand. To get a license, Kiwis need to go through police interviewing, gain references and be determined as fit to possess firearms.
The Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Christchurch mosque attacks found police had not conducted these in full on the terrorist who killed 51 people.
Superintendent John Price says since the 2019 terror attacks, police have conducted more home searches for prohibited guns.
Canterbury district Superintendent John Price agreed firearms searches had increased.
“The environment that we operate in since March 15 has been heightened. It has changed drastically.
“What we know is if someone had an ideology or a view or opinion on something like March 15, it just escalates – it is like cream rising to the top.”
ACT Party justice spokeswoman Nicole McKee said all gun owners were being treated like “violent gang thugs or ... potential terrorists”.
McKee said cases like Keenan’s were not uncommon and police needed to be careful not to overstep their jurisdiction.
“Yes, we need to make sure firearms are in the hands of fit and proper people, but we need to make sure that power is not being abused.”
Well before the mosque attack, the home of journalist and author of Dirty Politics Nicky Hager was raided by police as part of an investigation into his sources. In 2018, police apologized and acknowledged they breached his rights.
Hager, who is not a gun owner, believed police were out of their depth and the search was a waste of time.
“They took it on like they were investigating a P (methamphetamine) raid, someone selling P.”
Police admitted they inappropriately obtained Hager’s banking information, and that they obtained a search warrant despite him not being “a suspect of any offending”.
Hager said the house search was unpleasant for him and his family, with his daughter having to be accompanied by a female officer to get changed in her bedroom.
“They were doing a drug raid, on territory to do with democracy and rights, that they just weren’t equipped for. It was over the top.”
Former New Zealand Herald and Stuff columnist Rachel Stewart found herself on the wrong side of the new gun laws when in June her .22 rifle was confiscated following a Tweet she made.
Police went to her home without a warrant and handed her documentation telling her she was unfit to hold a license, confiscating her gun and ammunition.
Police cited a specific tweet, as well as “consistent Twitter posts in which you demonstrate a tendency to exhibit hatred towards the transgender community”.
Stewart said the confiscation came six weeks after the Tweet and showed no urgency.
“How much of a threat was I if they waited that long to confiscate my firearms?”
After making a legal submission her firearms license was posted back a few weeks later."
I've been shown emails between the Firearms Safety Authority and an Officer of the New Zealand Army applying for a renewal of his firearms licence.
The applicant was told that, because he has spent more than six months in Afghanistan in the last ten years, he needs a criminal record check from the local Afghan authorities.
The incredulous applicant had to explain to the FSA that he was in Afghanistan serving Her Majesty in hostilities between New Zealand’s armed forces and the Taliban.
The Taliban, being the current authority in Afghanistan, would be the same group from whom he would now have to request a positive reference.
Experiences like this are exactly why licenced firearms owners have become fed up with the way Police exercise their powers through the FSA.
Veterans often want to maintain their interest in and skills with firearms after leaving the armed forces. But they’ve told me they are often treated with suspicion by the Police, as if they are all unstable and PTSD-addled. This is an utterly disrespectful way to treat those who fought for peace overseas.
ACT’s coalition commitment secured a transfer of responsibility for the FSA from Police to another department – work that Firearms Minister Nicole McKee is now progressing."
Another doozy;
Following quote is an excerpt from a police statement that was used as the sole basis for suspension of a licensed firearm owner's license, a law abiding citizen holding a pilot's license. The ammunition, parts and firearms were properly stored as prescribed within the storage and transportation of firearms and ammunition guide and approved by previous police vetting and according to three witnesses was locked.
Police adamantly ignored facts and claimed they relied on the following policeman's statement as expertise; “I am not familiar with the requirements around storage of firearms however this did not appear to be adequate.”
The only relief within the present system via district court. A further
addition for taxpayer and LFO costs. A lawyer was employed and the
license was returned without any sort of police explanation.
A woman admitted to Wellington Hospital’s Emergency Department on Tuesday night says she witnessed chaos after the ward went to its most critical code red status four times over a five-hour period.
Kendall Collins-Crowdy, who was taken to ED with severe pain caused by endometriosis on January 20, said she witnessed staff being verbally and physically abused and dozens of patients forced into corridors or other wards due to overcapacity.
"Nurses and doctors were in tears. There were some security guards in tears. There was so much yelling going on and patients and their family members were being so grumpy that they were throwing things," the 19-year-old student told Stuff.
A code red status is instigated when demand outstrips available staff and beds. According to an OIA released to the Labour party, there were, on average, almost two a day at Wellington Hospital’s ED between January and October last year.