Examination of Witnesses (Questions 200
- 219)
TUESDAY 14 DECEMBER 1999
MR PATRICK
JOHNSON, MR
WILLIAM HARRIMAN,
LT COL
JOHN HOARE,
MR BEN
GILL AND
MR HUGH
OLIVER-BELLASIS
Mr Stinchcombe
200. Mr Gill, you talked just now about targets
we should be attacking if we are trying to deal with the unlawful
use of these weapons. I wonder whether you would agree with me
that there are two other targets we might want to have in our
sights: those who design these weapons, and those who trade in
them. If I can take you back to this advert, it was a Millennium
Christmas Brochure sent unsolicited to a youngster, advertising
things such as lighters and, then if we read on, the ultimate
fun gift for Christmas a James Bond style Walther PK air pistol;
". . . its sensational styling really makes it look the business";
sellable to anybody who phones up and says they are 18. Further
on the "Sporty machine gun. Fires 80 rounds . . . realistic
look . . . 500 rounds of ammo supplied free of charge. All action
special". Then we read on to the "Laserhawk Air Pistol
For Every Caller . . . plus an extended barrel for greater fire
power and accuracy . . . extended holder for repeat shooting without
the need to stop and reload. With Christmas just around the corner
what better present could there be?" Would you agree with
me it is outrageous that adverts such as that could be sent unsolicited
to youngsters just before Christmas, clearly advertising pistols
designed to look like the real thing, and clearly designed to
invite trade from people under the age of 18?
(Mr Gill) This concern is outside a farmer's remit.
It is The Gun Trade Association who should be concerned about
that. As a father of four children I am concerned about a whole
raft of unsolicited personal information that comes in almost
daily nowadays. I do not know where they get their access to data
from. There should be full reviews. The Gun Trade Association
obviously is a key area and others giving evidence may want to
comment on that. The key point I referred to is from my perspective
on farms.
201. As a farmer you would not need to have
a pistol or an air rifle that was designed to look like one of
these weapons, would you?
(Mr Gill) No, not to carry out the control of vermin
that I have talked about.
(Mr Johnson) The Gun Trade Association equally view
some adverts which appear in all sorts of odd places with some
trepidation and they have a code of practice which says that they
do not support those sorts of adverts. Of course, not every man
who advertises an air weapon is necessarily a member of The Gun
Trade Association.
202. Should we prohibit adverts such as this?
(Mr Johnson) I am not sure what "such as this"
amounts to, Chairman and that is always the difficulty. In adverts
where the word "ban" appears, we would be happier if
these adverts were not couched in those terms, but there is a
legitimate market, as there is a legitimate market in everything
else, for air weapons and it is legitimate for people to advertise
air weapons. The Gun Trade Association is working hard to try
and ensure that offensive adverts do not appear.
203. Should we prohibit the sale of these weapons
by phone?
(Mr Johnson) Your colleague, Mr Linton, raised this
question of phoning in and there are questions there that need
to be answered and it takes us back to what Mr Hoare and others
have said and the thing that we base our whole paper on. In many
of these areas what is needed is better education and not further
legislation. Further legislation will increase the pool of potential
offenders and what we need to do is address the issues in the
way that the liquor licensing people and the cigarette people
have done. There has been evidence gained through The Gun Trade
Association to show that where they have taken steps to improve
education and publicity through gun shops and through materials
which are sold there are improvements. That process needs to be
developed and it needs to be developed jointly. It needs to be
a joint enterprise between the shooting community and the government
and the police, not simply one element trying to address an issue
in isolation.
204. Is there any one of you who would prohibit
the sending of unsolicited mail advertising lookalike air pistols
for sale by phone? Would any of you advocate the prohibition of
that?
(Mr Harriman) Most of these things you are showing
here are non-lethal and they fall under the legality threshold,
so effectively they are no more than children's toys.
205. The ultimate fun gift indeed.
(Mr Harriman) That is a matter of taste for whoever
has sent that out. Their potential to do harm is about the same
as Britain's toy cannon which fires—
Chairman
206. Did you hear the police last week explaining
how they react when they turn up to complaints that these weapons
are being used?
(Mr Harriman) I did, sir.
207. You get your head blown off before they
have checked whether it is lethal or not.
(Mr Harriman) The police will react when any firearm
is mentioned, whether it looks like one of those or nothing like
it or whether it is a conventional break barrel air pistol which
looks nothing like an air rifle. They will react because when
the words "There is a man with a gun" go to that operational
room they can do nothing else.
Mr Stinchcombe
208. Am I right in thinking that not one of
you would say that these kind of advertisements should be prohibited?
(Mr Johnson) I do not like the word "prohibited",
Chairman, that is the stumbling block. If all we can speak about
are bans and prohibitions then we are failing to address the issues.
I am sure there are mechanisms which could be advanced and developed
which look at these, as The Gun Trade Association has done and
as a result of those sort of consultations it may be possible
that areas which the Government might wish to take an interest
in come up. 209. I will give you a particular example, the ban
on sales by phone. Surely to goodness that would at least enable
you to know that the person you were selling to was going to be
actually over 18 rather than simply say they were over 18.
(Mr Oliver-Bellasis) Mr Stinchcombe raises a very
specific point and I think it is quite difficult in that we do
not have the advert in front of us and so on. There are some very
real issues of concern to all of us that need looking at by professionals
to come up with a proper mechanism for managing the problem. I
believe that Mr Stinchcombe has eloquently articulated the need
for this review which could provide proper answers to a particular
problem, which certainly I would feel uncomfortable making a comment
about without having seen what the law is, what the advert is
and I am not an expert.
210. I thought you were the experts.
(Mr Oliver-Bellasis) Not in toys. We deal in the real
weapons.
(Lt Col Hoare) It is an offence to sell an air gun
to someone under age and that is what should be monitored and
that is what I suggested in my evidence. I certainly would not
countenance that sort of advert coming from my organisation or
any of those associated with my organisation.
Mr Fabricant
211. Mr Johnson, I can reassure you that I will
not be talking about bans and prohibitions. A little bit earlier
on you were talking about the need to focus on the individual
rather than the weapon and I think many of us would agree with
that. You also talked about the need for consolidation of the
legislation which is rather messy at the moment, in answer to
Mr Linton's questions. I want to move on to the subject of shotguns.
Shotguns can be lethal. Surely a good way to consolidate legislation
is to say that shotguns, as indeed air weapons, should be classed
as a schedule 1 weapon.
(Mr Johnson) I am going to pass your question on to
Mr Harriman who is a shotgun expert. Whatever proposals are made,
they have got to be seen to be effective and they have got to
be seen to improve public safety. We have seen no evidence that
the distinct separation of shotguns and part 1 firearms actually
leads to any different levels of public safety from those two
weapons.
212. No, but you yourself said it is messy,
there are different forms of licensing and you explained very
eloquently earlier on how police officers have to deal with different
types of weapon in different ways. If nothing else, would it not
be a tidying up exercise?
(Mr Johnson) And that is exactly what we are saying
no to, Mr Fabricant. Tidying up is not what is wanted in the sense
that from time to time the Government tidies up this little bit,
it tidies up that little bit and it tidies up another little bit
either through legislation or through advice from the Home Office.
When it does so we end up with more anomalies than when we started.
213. Is not consolidation a form of tidying
up?
(Mr Johnson) It would make things simpler as it would
put things under one statute with nowhere else to look. It would
eliminate some of the errors that are made. Our colleagues in
the Police Federation quoted in their evidence an Act which has
been superseded and it is an administrative error that needs correcting,
but it does not necessarily lead to saying, "Because we are
tidying up what we need to do is do this and this or the other".
(Mr Gill) What we are asking for is that there is
a full and proper review. There have been a number of reviews
since the original Act of 1920, which has resulted in undue complexities
and inconsistencies. It is not a matter of tidying up little bits
of the legislation it needs a total review so that we can establish
an effective way of taking matters forward into the years ahead.
214. Are you saying a review of all types of
weapons, air weapons, rifles, pistols, the lot?
(Mr Gill) Yes, but that should not presume that you
move them all into one category. We need to have consistency of
application across the country and a way that allows for a proper
exchange of information between the relevant bodies, between police
forces and between appropriate representative bodies so that there
is a better exchange of information to address the key issue,
which is ensuring the user is a proper and fit person to use the
firearm.
215. I take that point, Mr Gill, but would it
not be fair to say that the only category that counts is not how
the mechanism works but the effect of the mechanism and by that
I mean a lethal weapon or a non-lethal weapon? In fact, one could
even argue if it is non-lethal it is not a weapon anymore. Should
they not be the only two categories that really count?
(Mr Gill) I do not believe that is the case because
there are a string of other issues which need to be considered,
for example the effective range of the weapon. There are different
requirements for the different categories of weapons available
which can me met under existing arrangements already in place.
(Mr Harriman) The way in which shotguns are licensed
at the moment is arguably the only efficient and rational part
of the licensing regime because it goes back to what we have spoken
about already, which is licensing the person. There is no evidence
whatsoever to show that this system is not rigorous in any way
and the use of shotguns in crime is small and it halved between
1987 and 1997. Chief constables have a very wide-ranging power
to refuse shotgun certificates and also to revoke them if they
think that the applicant is a danger to public safety. I think
on that basis there is simply no case to change the way in which
shotguns are licensed. They are very different from section 1
firearms. A hunting rifle designed for shooting deer has a projectile
which goes several thousand yards, carries a lot of energy and
is capable of causing death or injury. Shotguns are rarely fatal
to human beings at ranges of in excess of 20 yards. They are capable
of causing injury with a bird shot at about 100-150 yards and
their theoretical maximum range with a number six shot, which
is about the most popularly used, is 220 yards. That is a mathematical
formula and in reality it is less than that, they are very different
things. I think the way in which they are licensed at the moment
causes no problems. We heard from the Scarman Centre, wrongly,
that European countries treat shotguns in a different way from
we do and that we are unique and there is some sort of anomaly,
but that is not correct. If it would help the Committee, I have
here a note on the way in which other jurisdictions deal with
shotguns and if you would like me to hand it up to your learned
clerk, I would be happy to give you that.
Chairman: Thank you.
Mr Fabricant
216. I have heard that in France and elsewhere
shotguns are handled differently. I like neatness. You advocated
very well how the licensing arrangement works for shotguns. I
have used a shotgun and I have used an SA assault rifle and it
depends on the range, as Ben Gill has said. If the licensing regime
for shotguns is so good, and I am not arguing that it is not,
why not use that for schedule 1 firearms?
(Lt Col Hoare) For certain schedule 1 firearms you
could quite easily use the same regime. A target rifle, either
a .22 or a 7.62, which is bolt action and no magazine, has never
been a favoured weapon of the criminal. It would be ludicrous
to hold up a bank with a .22 single shot rifle; you would be laughed
out of the bank. Now that handguns are no longer able to be held
legally in Great Britain that removes the last obstacle to remove
the rigour of the firearms regime from some items of schedule
1 firearms.
217. Would anyone else like to add anything
about that point?
(Mr Oliver-Bellasis) The only thing I would like to
add, Mr Fabricant, is that with schedule 1 firearms there is the
tendency for police forces to assign a territorial condition.
It would be extraordinarily difficult for people helping on farms
if a territorial condition were assigned to a shotgun, if it was
deemed necessary to put shotguns on to schedule 1 firearms.
218. Indeed, some of the evidence we received
last week tended to imply that there was no direct correlation
between numbers of legally held weapons and illegally held weapons
and the amount of crime conducted with weapons.
(Mr Oliver-Bellasis) We need that information very
badly.
Mr Fabricant: It makes me wonder whether any
legislation is effective. Thank you very much, Chairman.
Mr Stinchcombe
219. The 1997 handgun ban took 160,000 weapons
out of circulation. Has that simply led to some handgun owners
replacing those handguns with other legal weapons?
(Lt Col Hoare) There has been some transition of those
handgun owners to other disciplines who have remained with muzzle
loading pistols or with what is known as gallery rifles or lightweight
small rifles. These are rifles which use the same course of fire
as pistols but come under a different definition.
(Mr Johnson) It is very unusual that a certificate
holder holds one firearm. You have seen the statistics, it is
2.4. Take any sport, a man will not merely run 100 yards, he might
run four forties or what have you. A golfer will have a variety
of clubs. The statistics about transference are not clear at all
mainly because in the first place the police did not have the
evidence themselves. Although they hold all the information, they
could not even tell the Home Office what particular firearms were
held on what particular certificates. The notion that there has
been a wholesale dash to buy other forms is difficult to identify
let alone quantify. Most of these people will have had a number
of firearms to shoot in a number of disciplines, each bringing
its own particular individual use and the transference would be
a natural consequence. If you banned 100 metres racing tomorrow
you are not telling me the athlete would not choose to do something
else which is within his capabilities and abilities. There is
certainly no evidence of the wholesale purchase of other firearms
to make up for these.
(Lt Col Hoare) There is more evidence to show that
more people have walked away from the sport because of the stigma
which attached itself during 1996, 1997 and 1998. For example,
some of the Great Britain National Squad have emigrated to Jersey.
| 
