To rousing Conservative applause, the House of Commons voted Feb. 15 to approve legislation to end the long gun registry.
Bill C-19 now goes to the Senate for debate and committee hearings.
It will be a last stand for opponents of ending the registry but with a strong Conservative Senate majority, the bill is expected to be approved and passed into law by spring.
The bill will end the registry but keep the gun licensing regime and restricted weapons prohibitions in place.
The final Commons vote to support ending the registry was 159 to 130.
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Northwest Ontario New Democrat MPs John Rafferty and Bruce Hyder defied their party to vote with the government.
All other rural opposition MPs voted to abolish the registry.
The Commons vote ends a long and acrimonious debate that began with the Reform Party after Liberal gun registry legislation in 1995. It has been a toxic issue in Parliament and in politics ever since.
Opponents will use the Senate hearings to give their arguments about gun safety and victim rights one last airing.
And the Quebec government is vowing to keep the issue alive with a lawsuit to force Ottawa to turn over gun registry data on Quebec gun owners to the province so it can create its own registry.
The federal government says all the registry data will be destroyed once the bill becomes law. It will not support provincial registries.
