A national firearms registry will not work unless each state and territory government updates their "outdated" and often "paper-based" registry systems, warn gun advocates. 

In February National Cabinet agreed to Australia-wide firearms register to counter crimes such as the murders of two police officers by a trio that included former Walgett school principal Nathaniel Train.   

As it stands, Law enforcement agencies are currently relying mainly on state-level gun registers, and there is an existing national database called the Australian Firearms Information Network but the proposed new registry would offer something different - real-time access borders information about firearm licence holders.

Beyond that, the detail of how the register would work is still up in the air, and a lack of certainty is making some in the guns industry nervous - and frustrated. 

Shooting Industry Foundation Australia Chief Executive James Walsh told the Western Plains App, "We don't know what the proposed model is, and business has 12 days to respond to a complex set of terms of reference". 

The Federal Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus met with state police ministers earlier this month and agreed to open public consultation until April 25. 

"Questions need to be asked about how this is all going to work," Walsh said. 

"Most of the states haven't invested very much money in their registries, a lot of these state-based systems are paper-based, and the data going into them is very inferior". 

Walsh said he was concerned a federal registry would simply bring together various poorly functioning systems with inadequate data. 

ABOVE: Nathaniel Train. One of the men whose actions sparked calls for a national firearms database. Image: ABC. 

"Unless the states invest and upgrade their registry systems, I don't see how they integrate into a full IT system," he said. "We are concerned that this will be a rushed process, full of errors and another level of red tape stifling industry". 

Walgett gun seller David Thwaite told the Western Plains App that because his town was near the Queensland border, he saw a real need for a federal database providing it "used for the right reasons". 

"We have to know who has got guns. The state-based system is causing enormous problems for a gun dealership that resides close to the border," the owner of Walgett Hunt Camp Fish said. 

"As a knowledge base for security, there needs to be a nationalised system," he said. "People also relocate all the time now, so there needs to be a national system so information systems cannot break down." 

He said he hoped the model decided did not punish those who did the thing because some had been "recalcitrant."