Examination of Witnesses (Questions 60
- 79)
TUESDAY 7 DECEMBER 1999
ASSISTANT COMMISSIONER
JAMES HART,
CHIEF SUPERINTENDENT
PETER GAMMON,
SUPERINTENDENT KEVIN
MORRIS, MR
FRED BROUGHTON
AND MR
PAUL O'BRIEN
60. A 2.2 rifle?
(Mr Hart) Yes, a 2.2 target rifle, and that sort of
thing.
61. In your view, is there as great a threat
to the public from lawfully-held shotguns as there is from lawfully-held
Section 1 firearms?
(Mr Hart) Of course, both weapons are just as lethal;
high-powered rifles would be lethal over a greater distance. Nothing
more lethal, of course, than a shotgun at short range. So public
safety, I think, would be the same for both.
62. So are you therefore of the view that there
ought to be the same licensing regime for shotgun holders as for
Section 1 firearms?
(Mr Hart) Exactly so.
(Mr Gammon) Yes.
(Mr O'Brien) Yes.
63. You are all of that view, are you?
(Mr Hart) Yes.
(Mr Gammon) Yes.
(Mr O'Brien) Yes.
64. Can you tell the Committee what proportion
of offences against the person involving shotguns have arisen
out from lawfully-held shotguns?
(Mr Hart) I do not have that information.
(Mr Gammon) Even the Home Office Statistical Bulletin,
published recently, does not differentiate, unfortunately.
65. But is not this quite an important point;
you have all made the point that you quite accept that there is
a case for people having shotguns, particularly for sporting and
recreational and working use; those who do use shotguns and have
a certificate and are required to comply with onerous conditions,
as part of the issuing of that certificate, say to me, "Well,
what about the use of illegally-held shotguns?" We know how
many legally-held shotguns there are; do you know how many illegally-held
shotguns there are?
(Mr Gammon) No, we do not.
(Mr Hart) No.
66. Can you hazard a guess?
(Mr Hart) I have no idea. Weapons could go back sort
of dozens of years, could they not?
67. But if you cannot tell us how many offences
against the person involved the use of legally-held shotguns,
i.e., by definition, by people committing an offence who have
got a shotgun certificate, or by people who have seized a shotgun
for which they do not have a certificate from somebody else, but
if you cannot tell us that, are you really not providing us with
valid evidence to consider the claim that you have just made,
which is that there should be no distinction between shotguns
and other Section 1 firearms?
(Mr Hart) Let me say, I hope you do find our evidence
valid; the very point you make I attempted to clarify as recently
as yesterday afternoon.
68. I am sorry, I was elsewhere yesterday afternoon.
(Mr Hart) The Criminal Use of Firearms Committee do
run into this problem very, very regularly, I am advised, that
simply they run out of data on which to make very, very definite
judgements about criminal use of firearms. The data that you seek
is not recorded in the necessary detail; there are sufficient
anomalies in the data, that the errors and anomalies actually
perhaps will exceed the number of instances of the sorts of circumstances
that you describe. It is a difficulty, I acknowledge, it is an
enormous difficulty.
69. But, surely, if we are to make recommendations
which involve legislation, we have got to be able to make a case
to the British public that there is not just a perceived threat
but there is a real threat, and that the action which we take
is going to diminish that threat; and yet you are not presenting
us, at the moment, certainly, with evidence upon which we can
base a rational decision?
(Mr Hart) We rather hope, I think, that you would
find there is sufficient evidence in the remainder of the body
of our submission. The issue over criminal use, where actually
there is a commission and a satisfactory conviction of an instance
where a firearm, either legally or illegally, held has been recorded,
perhaps does not make up the entire body of evidence.
70. That is the entire point, it is whether
the offence is committed by a legally-held weapon, in which case
that is a cause for concern, or it is committed by somebody with
an illegally-held weapon. And, frankly, gentlemen, that is not
down to us, that is down to you, because you fail to do your job
in weeding out the illegally-held weapons. And there are some
who suggest that it is easier for the police to go after those
who are already subject to control, those who have already submitted
themselves to the process, rather than do the much more difficult
thing of going round the houses, whether urban or rural, and trying
to root out the illegally-held weapons?
(Mr Morris) Surely, you are not suggesting we have
the right to search every home in the country to see whether they
have got shotguns, legally-held or otherwise?
71. I am certainly not suggesting that there
should be an operation on that scale, but I am making the point
to you that, on the basis of what you have told us so far, certainly
as far as I am concerned, I do not have enough evidence to be
able to make a judgement that we should have further controls.
Because I am not convinced, from what you have told us, that any
more controls, for example, by moving shotguns into Section 1
requirements, is going to make a jot of difference to the number
of offences committed by people using lawfully-held weapons?
(Mr Morris) If I may, Chairman, in response to that,
great play was made earlier about the Dunblane incident. That
person—
Mr Winnick
72. Would it not be more appropriate to describe
it as a tragedy, rather than an incident?
(Mr Morris) A tragedy, yes, I quite agree, Sir, I
quite agree.
73. I should have picked up Mr Hart previously;
it is a tragedy, a terrible tragedy, not an incident?
(Mr Morris) Absolutely. That person could have been
banned from holding Section 1 firearms and yet legitimately hold
a shotgun, because of the inadequacies of our current legislation.
It is of little value to the victim of a crime whether it is a
legally-held weapon or an illegally-held weapon, or whether it
has a kinetic energy above 12 foot pounds; if the individual has
a loved one who is dead, or they are seriously maimed, then they
are not going to ask who had a certificate or not. But the bottom
line is, these are lethal, barrelled weapons, and, whether they
are shotguns or not, the control over shotguns is, quite simply,
far below that of the Section 1 firearms, and they are just as
lethal.
Mr Howarth: If I could make the point, of course
we accept that they are lethal weapons, obviously we understand
that, but if, for example, all the crimes involving the use of
firearms were confined to those illegally held then tightening
up the law on those weapons which are legally held would not stop
one further crime, and, indeed, would not prevent one further
person from losing their loved one.
Chairman
74. Mr Howarth, I think we are going to have
to move on, except to say, perhaps you might like to have a think
about this exchange and see whether there is any further letter
you want to send us on this very point; would that help?
(Mr Hart) I can, I think, I hope, summarise the views
of all of us, Chairman, on this point, it is in our submission.
It is this, that, yes, we accept that there will be all sorts
of controls necessary around weapons; we do accept, of course,
that the final decision around injury, or whether a weapon is
used legally or illegally, is the person that pulls the trigger
at the time. But we cannot just rely on that as the only judgement
that we make as far as the control of weapons is concerned, we
need other controls as well, and I hope we have tried to illustrate
to you where they are weak.
Mr Howarth
75. Chairman, may I put one question to Mr Gammon.
In your submission to us, you call for the chief officer of police
to revoke a licence. I had a case in my own constituency where
an individual who holds a shotgun licence, perfectly lawfully,
and has had no problems at all, has had his licence revoked, after
examination by the local police and they have revoked his licence;
he made a lot of complaints about it, but the discretion lies
with the chief police officer and his decision is subject to review
by the court. Surely, we have enough checks and balances in operation
at the moment, and what further powers would you recommend?
(Mr Gammon) As we said earlier on, we would like the
control over shotguns to equate with firearms certificates, so
there would be much more stringent control over the identity of
the weapons that they hold on the certificate, the amount of ammunition
that they can possess at any time, the storage of those weapons,
and indeed the criteria to use over whether that person is a fit
person to hold the weapon.
Mr Howarth: But, effectively, I have to say
that that decision has been, all those have been, taken into account.
Mr Cawsey
76. Can I move on to other Section 1 firearms
then. This morning, we have heard a little bit, the Federation,
for instance, talked about the difficulties of the fundamental
issue of definition, and we have also spoken about arbitrary cut-off
points, and, in the evidence we have received, the Scottish Police
Associations have been concerned about the increased use of other
weapons, such as muzzle-loading pistols, which can be concealed
like a hand-gun, since the 1997 Act has come into force. Again,
it is open to all three associations, but I would be interested
to know whether you believe that developments in firearms usage
and firearms technology since the 1997 Act has actually posed
an increased threat to public safety?
(Mr Hart) Can I start with that. There is certainly
some evidence that comes to us anecdotally, that there are people
on the edges, shall we say, of the firearms community that persistently
probe the legislation and the regulation to try to find new ways
of using weapons, new ways of adapting existing weapons, for their
own purposes. And it is often in the margins, as I said in my
introduction, these fringe areas that pose the greatest difficulty
to us, and you have put your finger on one of them, and that is
these muzzle-loading handguns, which are a little loophole in
the 1997 legislation that a group seem to want to jump through
at the moment. I do not know if my colleagues would want to elaborate
on that, but it is precisely the point on which you put your finger
that we are trying to urge into place.
77. For all this comment, is not that the problem
though, to a certain extent, it is a similar point to what Gerald
Howarth was making a minute ago, which is that every time we try
to erect the barrier somebody just thinks of a new way to jump
over it? And you say it is a little loophole in the 1997 Act,
but if it were not muzzle-loading pistols, would it not just be
something else?
(Mr Hart) Probably; our experience, anecdotally, is
that probably it would be something else, and if it were easy
I dare say we would have done it in 1997. And the point I make
to you is that these issues are present today and they pose a
threat to public safety.
(Mr Gammon) I think the history of legislation and
control in this country is that of evolution, and as technical
developments arise so we have to confront them, from a policing
and a legislative point of view. So just because something might
happen in the future does not mean to say we do not respond to
what is happening currently.
78. But in earlier answers they were talking
about the idea that everything should be covered by one Act, or
whatever, and that, again I will use the phrase that was used,
the fundamental issue will be definition. Now nobody would disagree
with that; but do you, as organisations, have in your own minds
what that definition is, because that is what we would have to
decide, ultimately?
(Mr Gammon) I am going through a great thought process
about how to define specifically. I think we would need collectively
to sit down and work that through.
(Mr O'Brien) Certainly, the existence of fast reloading
techniques for what previously have been regarded solely as muzzle-loading
weapons did not seem to happen until after 1997. I leave you to
draw your own conclusions.
79. Thank you for that. Can I move on then to
antique firearms and historic collections. What difficulties do
you encounter, as a Police Service, in licensing such collections
and weapons?
(Mr Hart) Of course, part of the problem with antiques
is their potential for reactivation in some way, and, as the evidence
suggests, that there is no clear definition of an antique, although
there is a list, I believe, of what is and is not. But, my understanding
is, it is this question of reactivation, what actually can be
perhaps illegitimately obtained, by means of burglary, or theft,
or what have you, and then reactivated in some way and used.
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