Police demonstrate what gun guy-back scheme will look like ahead of first public collection

Guns will be valued and made unusable on site.

Ahead of the country’s first buy-back event for military-style semi-automatic weapons, police have shown media what the collection process will look like.

Actors showed how owners will hand in their guns under the buy-back scheme or anonymous amnesty at public collection events.

There are currently 14,300 registered military style guns in New Zealand.

Police Minister Stuart Nash said he’s confident the process police have planned over the last three months will be run securely and efficiently.

"This will play a huge part in getting these banned weapons out of our communities … and preventing what happened on March 15 (Christchurch terrorist attack) from ever happening again in this country," he said.

Firearms will be disabled at the event, and sent to an off-site facility for shredding.

Licensed owners of firearms that qualify for Government-regulated compensation will receive payment within 10 working days of their weapon being valued at the collection event, and can dispute the valuation.

Owners handing any firearm in through the amnesty option will be encouraged to fill in a form, but do not have to.

Police want people to fill in an online registration form  before arriving at the event to save time, but this option is available on arrival.

The first of 258 events in the next few months will take place in Riccarton, Christchurch on Saturday, July 13.

"If we don’t have it right on day one, we will change the system to make sure we meet the demand," Deputy Commissioner Mike Clement said.

People with more than 10 firearms, owners who are deemed "high-risk" by police, and those that don’t have transport to a collection event, will need to contact police to arrange a pick-up.

Dealers are currently applying to be contracted drop-off points for police.

"I do think it’s appropriate, in fact that’s the advice that’s been given to us by the Australian authorities who went through this process in the mid-nineties," Deputy Commissioner Mike Clement said.

Anyone in possession of military style semi-automatic weapons after the amnesty ends on December 20 will face up to five years in prison.

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