The Australian parliament passed a national gun buyback program in January 2026, the largest since which year?

In January 2026, the Australian parliament enacted a significant national gun buyback program, the largest of its kind since 1996. This new initiative, spearheaded by the Albanese government, was a direct response to a terrorist attack at Bondi Beach in December 2025. The program aims to remove illegal, surplus, and newly banned firearms from the community, with a focus on enhancing national safety and tightening gun control laws across the country.

The precedent for such a comprehensive scheme was set nearly three decades earlier, following the devastating Port Arthur massacre in Tasmania in April 1996, which claimed 35 lives. In the wake of this tragedy, then-Prime Minister John Howard led a bipartisan effort to implement stringent gun control measures under the National Firearms Agreement. This historic agreement banned rapid-fire long guns, including semi-automatic and pump-action rifles and shotguns, and established a mandatory buyback scheme.

The 1996 buyback was monumental, resulting in the collection and destruction of over 650,000 firearms, funded by a temporary increase in the Medicare levy. This decisive action significantly reshaped Australia's approach to gun ownership and is widely credited with a marked reduction in firearm-related deaths and the absence of mass shootings for over a decade. The 2026 program, while responding to a different modern threat, echoes the scale and intent of these landmark reforms, making 1996 the benchmark for national gun buybacks in Australia.