Archive for December, 2025
Australian Rights Coalition to fight government over-reach on firearms
Monday, December 1st, 2025A new group fighting for Australian’s access to the outdoors, the Australian Rights Coalition (ARC), has launched in Perth, and is already counting more than 200 members among its ranks.
ARC’s purpose is to fight against government interference and over-reach with a focus on the “five Fs” of firearms, fishing, four-wheel driving, farming and forestry.
It is the brainchild of former WA upper house MP Louise Kingston and supported by Shooters Union WA state advocate Steve Harrison.
The ARC launch meeting on 22 November was attended by around 70 people, with keynote speakers including One Nation MP Rod Caddies, Legalise Cannabis Party MP Dr Brian Walker, WA Liberals MP Phil Twiss, WA Libertarian Party representative Jordan Woodhams and political science academic Joshua Forrester.
Two common themes from the speakers were how government over-reach and imposition were affecting everyone in Australia, and the importance of an organisation such as ARC to hold government to account.
The organisation takes is structural cues from the WA Speedway Association, having a ‘board of commissioners’ overseeing it and allowing multiple areas to be focused on.
The ARC organisation openly acknowledges the impetus for its formation was the current Western Australian Government’s handling of changes to the state’s firearms laws — a subject which has been covered extensively in Sporting Shooter for the past two years or so — and the heavy-handed, arrogant, dismissive way licensed firearm owners were treated and their concerns dismissed.
ARC initially launched a Gofundme campaign to assess if there was a need for an overarching organisation and raised more than $120,000 in record time, which Ms Kingston said demonstrated people were in support of its formation.
“It took many months of navigating the complex compliance and regulation, which further highlighted how cumbersome and costly government now is,” she said.
“Since incorporation and implementation of processes to accept membership, 200 people have already joined in just a couple of weeks, without much advertising.
“That shows how disempowered people are feeling and the need for ARC.”
ARC’s first order of business is launching a petition, supported by One Nation MP Rod Caddies, to introduce castle law to Western Australia, following the groundswell of support for the initiative in Queensland (where a petition calling for its introduction is now the most-signed in the state’s modern history) and NSW.
The WA petition being backed by ARC already has more than 1500 signatures and co-founder Steve Harrison said it was just a taste of the organisation’s plans.
“ARC intends to champion issues that are important to its members, such as castle law. If we can attract just the people who signed the firearms petition [in WA], we will start with a membership of 30,000 plus,” he said.
“We are passionate and committed to listening to what is affecting people and working on real solutions to make WA the state it should be and Australia the country it should be — that has been lost and it’s time to fix it.”
For more information on ARC, visit https://www.australianrightscoalition.org.au/