This was in Today's Toronto Sun:

An Angus Reid poll out this week shows a vast majority of Canadians — 72% — think the long-gun registry has done nothing to prevent crime. A survey of rank-and-file police officers is even more decisive, fully 92% of them want it scrapped. Yet neither of these telling statistics will stop chiefs of police who are reportedly planning a taxpayer-funded lobbying and education campaign to defend the registry. They should stop. A vote to kill Candice Hoeppner’s bill to scrap the long-gun registry is scheduled for Sept. 22 in the House of Commons. With numbers looking like the bill will survive, the long-gun registry appears doomed. As a result, the registry’s defenders are getting more and more desperate. The registry has wasted some $2 billion and drains at least $106 million a year more from taxpayers from all three levels of government. Police chief bureaucrats defend the registry because it gives them an excuse to purchase more computers, hire more staff and get larger budgets. However, the public gets that the long-gun registry doesn’t make them safer; it simply adds more bureaucracy to a process that already requires gun owners to be licensed before obtaining a firearm. Frequent use? Defenders frequently trot out the statistic that the registry is queried 11,000 times a day by officers. However, this is because all queries of the Canadian Police Information Centre automatically check the registry. If you’ve been pulled over by police in traffic, it’s more than likely the registry has been queried. Of course, police are trained to assume guns are always present because criminals don’t register their firearms! It’s worth noting that police chiefs have refused to commission a poll of their rank-and-file officers. No doubt they fear being proven to be out of step with the officers they purport to represent. An Edmonton officer conducted an online survey for Blue Line magazine and found 92% of those officers surveyed favoured scrapping the registry. The survey revealed that police fear inaccurate data from the registry is affecting police safety in every province and territory. Doubt about the usefulness of the registry is not limited to police officers. The Angus Reid poll reveals widespread Canadian belief that the long-gun registry has been a failure: 72% think it has been ineffective and/or had no effect on preventing crime. The survey further revealed a plurality — 44% — support scrapping it compared to 35% who want it kept (21% were undecided). Importantly, despite a ramped up effort by defenders of the registry over the past several months, these numbers have budged little since a similar poll taken last November. Support for scrapping the registry is far deeper than the traditional urban/rural split in Canada. Taxpayer-funded lobby and interest groups predictably beg for more and bigger government programs, regardless of their utility. However, it’s disappointing to see the chiefs of police join this bandwagon. Canadians should be mindful that the chiefs do not necessarily reflect the views of rank-and-file officers across the country. It’s likely any taxpayer-funded campaign of theirs to sell the public on benefits of the registry will prove no different than selling pyrite — fool’s gold. Fortunately, the registry’s shine is long gone. — Gaudet is federal director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation

Great post thanks for sharing.

Here is a good artile that deals with the chiefs of police attitude towards the registry

This registry doesn’t register
Just because police chiefs would like a long-gun registry does not make it good public policy or a wise public expenditure.
- FROM SATURDAY'S GLOBE AND MAIL
SEPTEMBER 03 2010 08:00 PM EDT

Rifles are shown lining a Ottawa hunting store's shelves, May 2006.
The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police cannot be faulted for their recent unanimous vote in support of the national long-gun registry. Police will understandably always want as much information about those they investigate as they can lay their hands on. It is in the nature of their business. A national fingerprint registry of Canadians would no doubt also be seen as an aid to police work. But just because police chiefs would like a long-gun registry does not make it good public policy or a wise public expenditure.

A RCMP evaluation of the Canadian Firearms Program released on Monday also argues for retention of the “full registry,” stating: “It is important for officer and public safety.” How important? While some $2-billion has been spent on the registry, there is no way to accurately deduce the registry's effectiveness in meeting its stated objective of minimizing the public risk from firearms.

The RCMP report argues that “universal licensing and registration of firearms create an atmosphere of accountability.” But how does this nebulous “atmosphere” explain the actions of Kimveer Gill, who used three weapons he had legally registered during his rampage at Montreal's Dawson College in 2006? Nor did this sense of accountability prevent Eric Kirkpatrick from using a registered weapon to murder his former boss at a company Christmas party in Vancouver two years ago, or indeed prevent other legally registered guns from being used in homicides, suicides and accidental deaths. There is simply no evidence to support the claim in the report that the knowledge that an individual is “accountable for their firearms and the use of them decreases the likelihood that an individual will misuse, traffic or commit a crime with a firearm.”

The RCMP report also argues that “in a call for service or investigation, general duty police officer safety is increased by knowing if firearms are associated to a person or residence.” Certainly that is the view of the police chiefs. But officers surely know that it is generally law-abiding citizens who will trouble to register their weapons, and that dangerous individuals and criminals will generally not bother with the red tape. James Roszko was banned from owning firearms. That fact was available to police. Yet he used three unregistered guns and one registered (but not to him) gun to kill four Mounties at Mayerthorpe, Alta., in 2005.

If passed, a vote in Parliament on a Conservative MP's bill to end the long-gun registry would not represent the end of gun control in Canada. Stringent and necessary requirements will remain in place for handguns, and restricted weapons such as automatic rifles. A process that already requires gun owners to be licensed before obtaining a firearm would remain, with safety and background checks required for gun owners. Rules for safe handling and storage of guns will remain in place. What will end is the cost, the red tape and the stigmatization of the “law-abiding duck hunters and farmers,” often cited by Prime Minister Stephen Harper. In the absence of any meaningful evidence of the long-gun registry's efficacy, the program should be ended.