Claim: Statistics demonstrate that crime rates in Australia have increased substantially since the government there instituted a gun buy-back program in 1997.
Verdict: REFUTES

Retrieved passages:
title: Gun control
text: determine whether the change in firearm deaths can be attributed to the gun law reforms." Many gun control advocates cite Australia as a case of successful gun control, but opposers of this legislation argue differently. According to studies, Australia's violent crime and gun crime had been falling since the early 90s. After the gun buyback, the crime dropped at exactly the same rate, prompting questioning if it was the buyback that caused the drop in crime, or if it would have continued without confiscating 26,000 firearms. A 2007 study found evidence that gun control laws passed in Austria in 1997

title: National Firearms Agreement
text: A study found that there were no mass shooting deaths of five or more in Australia from 1997 through 2006, though the authors note that it is impossible to prove the agreement was the cause. The Agreement includes a number of provisions. It was agreed to establish a temporary firearm buyback program for firearms that were once legal now made illegal, that according to the Council on Foreign Relations bought over 650,000 firearms. This program, which cost $230 million, was paid for by an increase in the country's taxes. The law created a national firearm registry, a 28-day waiting period

title: Gun laws in Australia
text: eventually failed in the Supreme Court of South Australia. The Australian Constitution requires just compensation be given for property taken over, so the federal government introduced the "Medicare Levy Amendment Act 1996" to raise the predicted cost of A$500 million through a one-off increase in the Medicare levy. The gun buy-back scheme started on 1 October 1996 and concluded on 30 September 1997. The government bought back and destroyed over 1 million firearms. In October 2002, a commerce student killed two fellow students at Monash University in Victoria with pistols he had acquired as a member of a shooting club.

title: Crime in Australia
text: laws and Australia's gun control laws have been held up as an example of a workable solution for the safer management of guns and gun licensing by citizens of the United States, and some of the members of Congress - "Crime statistics before and after the implementation of gun laws provide a quantifiable measure of their impact. As a consequence, Australia's gun laws and their impact have become part of the American gun debate. " The gun buy-back program which was implemented in 1996, purchased and destroyed mostly semi-automatic and pump action firearms. Crime in Australia Crime in Australia is

title: Gun buyback program
text: to this restricted use on the grounds that these highly specialised target pistols are large, visually distinctive and not readily concealable due to their overall size. In 2017, Australia had a national firearms amnesty, the first since 1996, in which individuals could surrender illegal firearms for destruction. In two gun buyback programs between 2003 and 2009, the Brazilian government collected and destroyed over 1.1 million guns. In 2004, the Brazilian government implemented a six-month national gun buyback program that met its stated objective of collecting 80,000 guns in less than three months. The government budgeted $3 million for the program,

title: Gun buyback program
text: two-month program, and it was deemed a failure, though no reason for the crime rate increase was given. Similar programs followed in other cities, including some cities that repeated their programs. However, no evaluation of such programs were published until 1994, after three researchers analyzed a 1992 buyback in Seattle, Washington. The study found that the "effect on decreasing violent crime and reducing firearm mortality is unknown." Gun buybacks have been held in Tucson (one in 2013) and Phoenix (three in 2013). In 2013, House Bill 2455 was signed into law by Governor Jan Brewer. H.B. 2455 and Arizona Revised

title: Gun buyback program
text: (or US$30 to US$145) per firearm depending on its type. All types of firearms were accepted including legal as well as illegal weapons. The 2007-2008 buyback collected a total of 104,782 firearms or around 7% of the county's estimated total number of firearms as well as 747,000 units of ammunition. Indications are that the buyback was successful in reducing the number of gun related deaths from accidents and has done quite a few to reduce the number of gun related deaths in suicides, homicides and car thefts. Australia had mandatory buyback programs in 1996 and 2003. Both programs were temporary

title: Gun laws in Australia
text: paper from the Australian Institute for Suicide Research and Prevention at Griffith University also studied suicide in Queensland only. The said "No significant difference was found in the rate pre/post the introduction of the NFA in Queensland; however, a significant difference was found for Australian data, the quality of which is noticeably less satisfactory." A 2010 study by Christine Neill and Andrew Leigh found the 1997 gun buyback scheme reduced firearm suicides by 74% while having no effect on non-firearm suicides or substitution of method. A 2014 report stated that approximately "260,000 guns are on the Australian 'grey' or black

title: Gun buyback program
text: and involved compensation paid to owners of firearms made illegal by gun law changes and surrendered to the government. Bought back firearms were destroyed. The 1996 "National Firearms Buyback Program" took 660,959 firearms out of private hands comprising long guns, mostly semi-automatic rimfire rifles and shotguns as well as pump-action shotguns, and a smaller proportion of higher powered or military type semi-automatic rifles. Because the Australian Constitution requires the Commonwealth to pay "just compensation" for private property it takes over, the Government increased the Medicare levy from 1.5% to 1.7% of income for one year to finance the buyback program.

title: Gun laws in Australia
text: Criminology to monitor the effects of the gun buyback. The institute has published a number of papers reporting trends and statistics around gun ownership and gun crime. Many studies have followed, providing varying results stemming from different methodologies and areas of focus. David Hemenway and Mary Vriniotis of Harvard University, funded by the Joyce Foundation summarized the research in 2011 and concluded; “it would have been difficult to imagine more compelling future evidence of a beneficial effect.” They said that a complication in evaluating the effect of the NFA was that gun deaths were falling in the early 1990s. They

title: Crime in South Africa
text: the government had a widely publicised gun amnesty program to reduce the number of weapons in private hands. In 1996 or 1997, the government has tried and failed to adopt the National Crime Prevention Strategy, which aimed to prevent crime through reinforcing community structures and assisting individuals to get back into work. A previous Minister of Safety and Security, Charles Nqakula, evoked public outcry among South Africans in June 2006 when he responded to opposition MPs in parliament who were not satisfied that enough was being done to counter crime, suggesting that MPs who complain about the country's crime rate

title: Gun laws in Australia
text: Simon Chapman concluded: "Australia's 1996 gun law reforms were followed by more than a decade free of fatal mass shootings, and accelerated declines in firearm deaths, particularly suicides. Total homicide rates followed the same pattern. Removing large numbers of rapid-firing firearms from civilians may be an effective way of reducing mass shootings, firearm homicides and firearm suicides." In 2007, a meta-analysis published in the Australian Medical Association's "The Medical Journal of Australia" researched nationwide firearm suicides. They said that the analysis was consistent with the hypothesis that "measures to control the availability of firearms... have resulted in a decline in

title: Gun laws in Australia
text: suicide rates far more than the availability and use of firearms. Thus, suicide rates would not seem to be readily affected by making firearms less available." Harding later supported 1985 laws to restrict gun ownership in New South Wales, saying that laws contributing to "slowing down in the growth of the Australian gun inventory" are "to be welcomed". In 2002, Jenny Mouzos from the Australian Institute of Criminology examined the rate of firearm theft in Australian states in territories following the firearm regulation. She found that "the NFA... is having the desired effect: securely stored firearms are proving less vulnerable

title: Gun laws in Australia
text: total suicide rates" and recommended further reduction in the availability of lethal means. A 2008 study on the effects of the firearm buybacks by Wang-Sheng Lee and Sandy Suardi of University of Melbourne and La Trobe University studied the data and concluded "the NFA did not have any large effects on reducing firearm homicide or suicide rates." In 2009 a study published in the "Journal of Sociology" examined the rate of firearm suicide in Queensland. They found that "gun suicides are continuing to decrease in Queensland" and is "most likely as a function of ongoing gun controls". In 2009 another

title: Monash University shooting
text: had acquired his firearms legally. The Victorian State Government prepared new laws doubling the punishment for misuse of handguns and introducing new laws against trafficking in handguns after the shooting, and all other states followed. The National Handgun Buyback Act 2003 put new restrictions on maximum calibre, magazine capacity and minimum barrel lengths for all handguns. Victoria began its handgun buyback scheme in August 2003. Lee Gordon-Brown, Alastair Boast, Brett Inder, Bradley Thompson, Andrew Swann and Colin Thornby all received bravery awards for their part in restraining Xiang and helping injured victims. The Royal Humane Society awarded Gordon-Brown the 2005

title: Gun laws in Australia
text: University which concluded; "Current evidence showing decreases in firearm mortality after the 1996 Australian national firearm law relies on an empirical model that may have limited ability to identify the true effects of the law." Until 1996, the federal government had little role in firearms law. Following the Port Arthur massacre, the Howard Government (1996–2007), with strong media and public support, introduced uniform gun laws with the cooperation of all the states, brought about through threats to Commonwealth funding arrangements. Then Prime Minister John Howard frequently referred to the United States to explain his opposition to civilian firearms ownership and

title: National Firearms Agreement
text: Another study by Baker and McPhedran in 2007 did not find a significant effect of the NFA on Australia's homicide rate. While research does show a steady decline in gun-related suicides, the reduction occurred at the same time as an overall reduction in the Australian suicide rate. What’s more, firearm-related suicides had been declining in Australia for nearly ten years before the 1996 restrictions on gun ownership. A 2009 study also found that firearm suicide rates were decreasing in Australia before the NFA was passed, and concluded that "The implemented restrictions may not be responsible for the observed reductions in

title: Political positions of Hillary Clinton
text: occasion in 2015 that Australia's gun buyback program was "worth looking at" and "worth looking into," although such a program is not part of her gun policy proposals. Although the Australian program was compulsory, Clinton referenced it alongside voluntary gun buyback programs conducted in U.S. communities, comparing them to President Obama's Cash for Clunkers program. Clinton made gun licensing and registration a part of her 2000 Senate campaign. Clinton was taught to shoot and hunt by her father. On hunting and shooting, Clinton said in 2008: "It's part of culture. It's part of a way of life. People enjoy hunting

title: National Firearms Agreement
text: with regard to changes in the rate of unarmed robbery following the law. In 2016, Samara McPhedran, a Griffith University academic, reviewed the literature on the NFA and homicide and reported that of the five studies she found on the topic, "No study found statistical evidence of any significant impact of the legislative changes on firearm homicide rates." Simon Chapman and colleagues reported in 2016 that there were no mass shootings in Australia between when the NFA became law and May 2016. The same study also found that "there was a more rapid decline in firearm deaths between 1997 and

title: National Firearms Agreement
text: for firearm sales, and tightened firearm licensing rules. The law requires anyone wishing to possess or use a firearm with some exceptions, be over the age of 12. Owners must be at least 18 years of age, have secure storage for their firearms and provide a "genuine reason" for doing so. In 1997, the Prime Minister appointed the Australian Institute of Criminology to monitor the effects of the gun buyback. The institute has published a number of papers reporting trends and statistics around gun ownership and gun crime, which it has found to be mostly related to illegally held firearms.