Was that directed at me? If so, could you please elaborate?

I am, or more accurately, was, a sports shooter.

I competed for this country at an international level for a number of years. I am well embedded in the firearms community both as a competitor, and as a recreational user/hunter.

I am affected by the new legislation and have to hand in my $4500 rifle, and all the accompanying accessories for what Simon Bridges has said is an $800 buyback.

I also have two Masters Degrees, one of them being in Public Policy, which is pertinent to this discussion because it exemplifies experience in the political decision-making process.

What I have stated, multiple times I might add, is that the law should be consistent. If the primary purpose of this new legislation is to increase public safety by reducing the number of guns that are considered 'dangerous', then that same logic should follow on to other categories of licences including C and B license holders. You could, in fact, put forward an argument that an MG42, a .50cal, an HK G36, all full-auto btw, are more 'dangerous' than your everyday semi-auto AR. So if ARs are banned, then ban them too. Ban pistols as well. I want to see consistency.

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In my opinion, I truly believe that the govt fucked things up. I agree that not everyone should be able to own an AR. However, there are a significant number of us who do actually use them for things like competition. Over time, shooting and hunting have come to define me as an individual. It's something I'm good at and it's something that is immensely interesting to me. I enjoy going over the components of my rifle, over the bullet, over my stance. Like a petrol head looking over his/her/zer car, I too look over my rifles checking headspace, magazine conditions, optics, and so forth. I've invested so much time, money, and energy into this hobby, and the sad thing is, I can't ever get it back. A blanket legal application like this is so indiscriminate. It just fucks the whole thing up.