New Handguns CBSA

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Sounds like the never ending story of the Dutch Police trying to buy a new standard handgun. See for example http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2...ama-continues/

What is so difficult about buying an off-the-shelf item like a handgun?

H.

[rob love]

Originally Posted by Hanno Spoelstra

What is so difficult about buying an off-the-shelf item like a handgun?

Canada makes it hard. Rather than simply buying off the shelf, we want all the drawings given to Colt Canada ( formerly Diemaco) so they can make us the spares in the future. We tendered for the pistols and for rifles to replace the Cno4MK1* Enfields in use by the Cdn Rangers. There were apparently no takers.

We had done this in the past with various arms, including the Hipower. Often we pay a royalty per gun, and agree not to sell to other countries. However, we often did sell or give them as mutual aid.

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Originally Posted by rob love

Canada makes it hard.

So does Holland - we indeed have a lot in common.

The Dutch Police uses the Walther P5 since 1979. Since spares were longer available, procurement for a replacement started in 2008 to replace the P5 by 2010. The European tender for a new handgun was about nine months late because none of the candidate substitutes met the requirements (...). Early 2011 the Ministry of Security and Justice announced the firm SIG SAUER would deliver the new gun: the SIG SAUER PPNL (Police Pistol Netherlands) specifically made for the Dutch police. In November 2011 the government called off the purchase because this weapon would be of insufficient quality and unsafe. In October 2012 it was made known the pistol of choice would be the Walther P99Q as the successor to the P5. By late next year, police officers should have their new service weapon....

Why would the Dutch police need a pistol specifically made for them?
Why would they need about 6 years to select and buy a handgun?

H.

[Marc Montgomery]

I never saw the need for CBSA to be armed. Its merely a status ploy by the agency. Let me see, the number of times a border guard has had a gun pointed at them has been....um zero?

I believe this "desire" was accentuated by a border incident a few years ago where a US bad guy and US agents shot at each other as he tried to run the Cdn border.

There is however a real possibility of agents committing suicide (or worse) with their service pistol..something that happens occasionally with police and other armed agencies.

[rob love]

Originally Posted by Marc Montgomery

I never saw the need for CBSA to be armed. Its merely a status ploy by the agency. Let me see, the number of times a border guard has had a gun pointed at them has been....um zero?

There was a female guard shot at a BC border crossing back in Oct of 2012. The officer was shot in the neck with no warning by a guy who committed suicide right after.

With odds like that, I would wager the threat to border guards is actually lower than many other professions who will likely never be armed in Canadian society.

[chris vickery]

Hmm. And here the Canadian Government is afraid of joe average owning firearms, yet all in all, us average people don't own or use firearms to assert or abuse power over others. Nor do we shoot our partners, ourselves, innocent civilians etc etc. Methinks it a jealousy thing, as our guys look across the bridge and see Homeland Security armed to the teeth.(we need toys to look tough too!)
Those so employeed in jobs such as Civil servants in uniform need not be armed to rip me off for tax money.
Maybe Canada Post needs to arm up too?

[Marc Montgomery]

well rob, lesson learned..beware of absolutes... Ok one guard shot at, serious injury, but recovered....motive absolutely unclear..if any.. but I dont see how if the guard was armed it would have made any difference--in that particular instance..

I suspect Chris has a point about jealousy and looking tough.. I just dont see the need for customs folks to be armed...just more chances of injuries and worse through accidents..far more than actual need.

Meanwhile...it seems a horrific shame that if the military is going to get new sidearms, that the highly collectible IHP will be melted rather than sold to legit authorized collectors and give the govt a pretty darn good boost in the public coffers.

That I suspect is perhaps due to political correctness in that a certain segment of the population would scream if the govt was to sell off handguns to the public, regardless of the complete legality of potential purchasers, ownership, handling etc.

However, has the govt in the past sold off handguns to the public at any time? They can't sell the rifles due to the full auto functionality of course, but has military and police always melted their exchanged pistols?