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NORTHWEST TERRITORIES
The Conservatives' bill to scrap the long-gun registry is ill-conceived, vindictive and costly, according to Western Arctic MP Dennis Bevington, which is why he refused to register a vote for or against it in the House of Commons last week.

Two other NDPs - Thunder Bay-Rainy River MP John Rafferty and Thunder Bay-Superior North MP Bruce Hyer - voted with the Conservatives, while Skeena-Bulkley Valley MP Nathan Cullen walked out before the vote.

Bevington was the only NDP member to abstain from voting.

"The Conservatives put a poison pill in this bill," he said, referring to their motion to destroy all data collected to date by the registry.

"Provinces, territories, even First Nations governments, should have a say for their communities, how their gun laws are put in place."

Bevington said he plans to put forward an amendment to the bill that would allow provinces and territories to access the data for the next three years. By doing so, he said they could create their own long-gun registries, and at a much lower cost than starting from scratch.

"The NWT can make its choice at the legislative assembly whether it would want to get into this or not," he said.

Denny Rodgers, mayor of Inuvik and president of the Western Arctic Conservatives, was critical of Bevington's refusal to vote with the Conservatives.

"You don't join a political party to sit on your hands. Northerners are and have been opposed to the long-gun registry for quite some time and I'm disappointed that he didn't vote against it," he said.

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