Examination of Witnesses (Questions 140-157)
HARRY BERGER, DR IAN CHRYSTIE, KEVIN MOORE AND JUDE
TALBOT
2 NOVEMBER 2010
Q140 Chair:
This is the third evidence session in the Committee's inquiry
into firearms. We have as witnesses today some of the victims
of those who were involved in the Cumbrian shootings and the families
of some of the deceased.
Can I begin, Ms Talbot, Mr Moore, Mr Chrystie and
Mr Berger, by passing on—from every Member of this Committee—our
deep condolences at the losses that you have suffered as a result
of these terrible shootings and, indeed, our sympathy for all
of you who have been injured by what has happened. It must be
a terrible experience for you.
Can I begin with you, Mr Moore—and each of
you in turn can please speak to the Committee and tell us your
views—do you feel that you have had an opportunity to put
your side of the events to officialdom as a result of what happened
in Cumbria?
Mr Moore: By coming
down here today you mean?
Chair: Generally, since
the terrible events of June.
Mr Moore: Yes.
Q141 Chair:
Do you feel, Mr Chrystie, that all the authorities dealing with
the aftermath have been helpful in providing you with information
about precisely what has happened, or would you like to know more
about what happened on that particular day?
Dr Chrystie: I
think "helpful" is a bit of an understatement. I think
the relevant authorities have been more than brilliant.
Q142 Chair:
Ms Talbot, can you tell me—perhaps you can start on behalf
of all of the others, or any of the others might want to intervene—how
you were affected by the shootings that occurred on 2 June?
Ms Talbot: My father
was killed and obviously it was very shocking and distressing
at the time. I've had to come to terms with the death of my father;
my children with the loss of their grandfather. I've also had
to support my mother, and it's been difficult because not only
has my father died but my father was murdered. I've had to deal
with the emotions and it's been quite difficult to understand
that somebody looked at my father and then shot him dead, and
that's been a difficult thing to explain to my children as well.
Mr Berger: I'm
fortunately in a slightly different position. I survived. Yes,
I have looked into the eyes of a murderer. My thoughts on it are
very simple that, fortunately, we never have to face him in a
court of law because I don't know that there's necessarily anything
legally that could be done to replace what he did, or undo what
he did, I should say, and I think the authorities have looked
after—certainly, from my point of view as a victim, and
I know Dr Chrystie's daughter in the same way—extremely
well, and I don't think there is anything else that they could
do.
I would like to make a point, if I may: I have read
the previous two Committee meetings' worth of notes. I am a firearm
and shotgun certificate holder and I regularly—and I would
still use the word "regularly"—shoot. I find it
very difficult to see how anything else can be done in the application
process for shotguns and firearms. Firearms obviously are a slightly
more dangerous weapon, in the sense of their distance to kill
as opposed to their width of kill. Other than the medical aspects,
that I know the Committee have looked at, it's very difficult
to tell. How does one know when somebody is just going to flick
the light switch and change from being sane to insane?
Mr Moore: I think
the way the firearms is, it's the amount of ammunition they can
get hold of and have in stock, I think, that is worrying as well.
Is it 1,500 rounds they can have for a 22, unlimited for a shotgun?
I think something needs to be done about that. With myself, if
someone wants to have firearms, like a farm or something like
that, yes, they can have them at home but anyone else, the public,
I think they should be locked away in a gun club or something
like that, not so any time they can get hold of them, and then
something like this wouldn't happen again.
Dr Chrystie: I
think I accept Mr Berger's thesis, because I used to have a firearm
certificate for a 22 rifle. But it is an undeniable fact that
if the late Mr Bird had not had access to firearms he would not
have been able to use them. I have also read the deliberations
of the Committee and also looked a bit further. I find it interesting
that if one takes the close to 1.5 million shotguns they're on
average spread over about two and a half people each. Well, quite
a lot have only one. This means that there must be a lot of people
who have five or six and so on, which seems odd. The thing that
struck me from the previous meeting—I think I'm correct
in saying—that your second witness related a tale of a farmer
complaining to him about the suggestion that ammunition should
be limited, by saying that if he woke up in the morning and wanted
to shoot the odd rabbit then he wouldn't be able to. I don't feel
that wanting to shoot the odd rabbit is a reasonable reason for
holding a firearm licence.
Q143 Nicola Blackwood:
I would like to join the others on this Committee and say thank
you so much for coming today. I know that it has taken a lot of
bravery to come and speak out, and we are very grateful for this.
I wondered if you could talk a little bit about the impact that
this event has had, perhaps, on yourselves but also on the wider
community, and if that has changed the way you view firearms ownership
in this country. I wonder if you'd like to start, Ms Talbot?
Ms Talbot: I can
certainly speak about how it has affected myself and my children,
and, in particular, my son who's nine. Previous to this event
he enjoyed pretending to be a soldier; playing with guns, and
normal playground games. Following this event he has found it
very difficult to engage in that kind of play and also has found
it hard when his friends do. It's obviously become very real to
him, so it's changed his perception and he has also packed up
quite a lot of his different Xbox games and won't play them now,
those involving violence. So take from that what you will.
The wider community: I don't live in Cumbria. I live
and work in the Slough area in a large special school, and the
Cumbria shootings did have a very big impact on my colleagues
and the parents of children in my school, in that they did find
it shocking and distressing.
Q144 Mr Winnick:
Like all my colleagues—and indeed all in the House of Commons—we
were so shocked, to say the least, by what occurred and, as the
Chair said, all our sympathies go to yourselves and your neighbours.
As far as gun control is concerned, the details we
received are that Bird was given authorisation in 1974 for a shotgun.
In 1982 he had a conviction for drink driving, which didn't affect
his certificate, and in 1990 there was a conviction for dishonesty,
after which the police admit his shotgun certificate should have
been reviewed and wasn't. I'm just wondering—and we would
all appreciate your views—do you feel that, in all the circumstances,
Bird was the sort of person who should not have been given a certificate,
which, years later, was to lead to the terrible tragedy in Whitehaven?
Mr Moore, Mr Chrystie, Mr Berger?
Mr Moore:
No, because I think he held a shotgun licence from about 1974,
didn't he?
Chair: Yes, since he was
16.
Mr Moore:
Since 16, yes. His 22 licence he only had in the last five years,
hadn't he, or something? No, I don't think there was problem with
him holding a gun licence; it's what he's done with it though,
isn't it, at the latter end? That's the problem.
Q145 Mr Winnick:
One of the questions that will undoubtedly be of concern to politicians
is that, arising from what occurred—and previously of course
in Dunblane, and before that another tragedy when legislation
was tightened—is there, in your view, any need now to further
strengthen controls over the authorisation of people to hold firearms?
Mr Berger?
Mr Berger: Yes,
I've thought about this and, without being either an MP or a celebrity,
one of the most public figures you are going to get in a community,
however big or small, is going to be your taxi driver. Please
don't get me wrong, I'm not defending the guy at all here, but
if somebody in as public a position, in the sense of the number
of public that meet him, are carried in the back of his taxi,
or whatever, if that person is seen to be—there would be
reports to the police if anybody suspected that he was either
odd or seemed to be dishonest in taking somebody on a roundabout
route. I just think that in as public a position as he was, in
the sense of a taxi driver, he had to be even more careful about
what he was doing to maintain his shotgun and firearm certificates.
I agree that if somebody is going to become insane, or has an
alcohol problem—as has been seen with a recent shooting
in London where there was a history of a medical problem—if
you're not going to take away the licence for that—and bearing
in mind that person was married to somebody in some sense of authority—then
who's going to have their licence taken away? Don't get me wrong,
I'm not saying take everybody's licence away. I'm not saying that,
but what I am saying is that he was a public figure; "public"
with a small "p" I hasten to add. But the police had
no reason—other than the past convictions of some time ago,
there was no reason to suspect that there was anything wrong more
recently than that.
Q146 Mr Winnick:
The last question: Mr Berger, however, the Association of Chief
Police Officers have sent us a report, which we received earlier
today, and it does make the point that in 1990—as I mentioned—Bird
had a conviction for dishonesty, and they say—and I'm reading—"should
have caused his shotgun certificate to be reviewed", and
go on to say, "Given the length of time ago, the file has
been weeded out of any record of what occurred." But it does
appear that if his shotgun certificate had been reviewed at that
time, 20 years ago, arising from the conviction for dishonesty,
it's possible, is it not, that the authorities would have decided
that he should not have continued to have a shotgun?
Mr Berger: Shotgun
certificates—and forgive my brain, I'm addled with legalised
narcotics at the moment—every five years you have to reapply
for your licence. So every five years the police have the opportunity—and
I believe the report that is probably sitting in front of you
that is going to be released today, basically says that there
was nothing wrong with the fundamental process, with the way that
the Cumbria Police authorised shotgun and firearm certificates.
Every five years they have the opportunity to review and if, after
a certain number of years, they decide that—I have a drink
driving conviction from 20 years ago. I don't mean to put a nail
in my coffin, but I have a shotgun and firearms certificate. It
doesn't mean that I've flipped; I've gone mad.
Q147 Steve McCabe:
I'd also like to thank you for coming today. I know this can't
be easy for you. But if I can just follow on from the point that
Mr Berger was raising. Some of the witnesses who legally hold
firearms have put it to us that, intense and traumatic though
this event has been, events like this are fairly rare, and were
we to take action to tighten the law against people who legally
use firearms, for sport or whatever purposes, it may be disproportionate,
given the rarity of these kind of events. What is your view of
that?
Mr Berger: All
that is going to happen is you're going to drive things more underground.
Surely, the tighter the controls, the harder it is becoming for
the authorities to police it because any member of this room could,
I would hazard a guess, within 48 hours—I'm not saying you're
going to try it, but I would guess that within 48 hours somebody,
if they really wanted to—really wanted to—could get
hold of an illegal firearm. So all you're potentially going to
do by tightening regulation is drive things further underground.
How do you differentiate between the vermin control
and the person that just shoots for sport or for any other recreational
reason?
Q148 Steve McCabe:
Is that a view shared by the rest of you?
Dr Chrystie: That
I think is one argument. But I would suggest that if we all in
this room suddenly decided that we wanted to take up clay pigeon
shooting, most of us could probably currently get a licence. If
the licensing conditions were changed, such that most of us couldn't,
we'd probably say, "Oh fine" and take up archery. I
don't think that if you're prevented from getting a firearms certificate
you're, necessarily, going to go to the more seedy parts of your
local big city and find a sawn off shotgun. I wouldn't even know
where to start. I think it would probably take me a year or two
rather than 48 hours.
It is a difficult one, in that there are those who
enjoy shooting as a sport. I think I'm right in saying that the
House had to change the rules somewhat to allow the 2012 Olympics
to take place, because a number of the shooting events are illegal—but
we've managed to sort that out—and that many of those who
shoot competitively for this country have to go elsewhere to practise,
but they seem to be able to cope with that as well.
Q149 Dr Huppert:
I'm interested in understanding a bit more about various aspects
of licensing. I'm getting some very interesting messages and thank
you very much—as everyone has said—for coming here
and sharing your experiences.
We've talked a bit about the idea of having too many
controls. I'd be interested if you have any comment on the suggestion—which
I think Mr Moore made—about limiting ammunition and control
of that; about control on the number of shotguns that are available
to people, if we could just touch on as well. Also something which
I know isn't relevant in your particular case, which is about
airguns and whether you have any thoughts about licensing on all
of those. Since we seem to have started on the right quite a number
of times, can I perhaps start with Ms Talbot?
Ms Talbot: My opinion
is slightly different to the gentlemen. Just as a background,
you know I grew up in Cumbria where it's fairly normal to have
a shotgun and to go off shooting in the fields. A good proportion
of my friends' fathers had shotguns in the house and as a child
I would see them. They were kept in a safe. Now I don't think
that guns have any place in a residential setting. My opinion
is that we should not have guns kept in a dwelling. Although that
may be difficult to enforce I see no reason why they can't be
kept in gun clubs. For farmers, I'm sure they would be able to
find some outbuilding or there would be another creative way around
it. But I don't think we should be keeping things that kill and
maim within a residential area, it's too big a risk.
Mr Moore: Yes,
I agree with what Ms Talbot said. Apart from farmers or vermin
control companies, no one else should have guns on the property,
I don't think, or if they have the guns on the property they shouldn't
have the ammunition, either one or the other. Maybe ammunition
kept at a police station or something like that.
Dr Chrystie: Yes,
I would agree with that. I can see no logical reason, other than
sport, why an individual—who is not a professional—needs
to own a firearm. If we're talking about vermin control then perhaps
we need to have more people who are trained to use them. I did
toy with the idea of suggesting, so I'll suggest it, I drive a
car, which is a lethal weapon. My licence doesn't give me the
right to own the car; it gives me the right to use it because
I am supposedly competent and have demonstrated that competence.
I don't know whether a similar suggestion has ever been made with
reference to firearms. You asked about airguns. Other than the
fact that I dread to think how many airguns there are scattered
around the country, yes, I believe they should be licensed.
Mr Berger: I have
a completely opposite view to everybody else, for various different
reasons. One of the things—certainly from the farming community,
and I use "the farming community" as a fairly broad
term. I include most of the rural community. Yes okay, slightly
controversial, since the House banned hunting with dogs, I saw
a fox this morning on my way to the station at 6.30am. There are
still lambs around. What do you want to win? I would prefer to
eat a lamb than a fox. Sorry, I just have a very different view
on this, and you can't answer it in two minutes. It's not a two-minute
answer. As this Committee understands, this is quite a broad discussion.
Chair: All right. It is
a complex issue, Mr Berger. Thank you for that. Mr Chrystie, you
had a comment?
Dr Chrystie: I
was just going to add a couple of words, which is the urban fox.
If we're going to control the rural fox with a shotgun, are we
going to control the urban fox similarly? Probably not.
Q150 Chair:
Ms Talbot, I want to ask you a question, based on your own personal
experience as a teacher rather than you coming to this Committee
as an expert on this issue. I think, you mentioned video games?
Ms Talbot: I did.
Chair: Do you think violent
video games have an effect on young people when they may or may
not use firearms, and were you aware that there is no minimum
age for the possession of a licence for a shotgun for a young
person?
Ms Talbot: I was
aware about the minimum age; obviously growing up in Cumbria,
there were people I went to school with that were joining gun
clubs and things like that. Video games, I think it's an easy
out. I think specifically little boys have a need to express themselves
in that way. If you don't let them have toy guns they will use
a stick and pretend it's a gun. I don't think that video games
are the cause of these feelings in children, but I do think they
don't understand what they mean.
Q151 Mr Burley:
I was interested in your experience, as a mother, that your children
had stopped playing certain Xbox games, presumably violent ones
or ones with guns, and I wondered if you could talk a little bit
more about that. Because we had evidence before the last Committee
from some experts who said they felt that these very violent gun
dominated video games do normalise a certain behaviour, and do
normalise the use of firearms, and that it's very easy for kids
who think that that's the normal way to go about things to then
take that behaviour on to the streets, and so on.
Ms Talbot: Can
I request that the press don't report on my children's experiences
before I say anything?
Chair: Sorry, are you
going to give us those experiences now?
Ms Talbot: Well,
I can talk about—
Chair: Well, I'm afraid,
Ms Talbot, everything that you say is in the public domain.
Ms Talbot: Okay.
Chair: Making a request
to the press, although we would love to believe that they would
follow our request, is not normally adhered to. Everything that
you say—so think carefully before you say anything—is
actually—
Ms Talbot: Okay,
I won't talk about that then.
Chair: Okay. Thank you
very much. Mr Berger?
Mr Berger: I live
in the country now. I was born and brought up in the countryside.
I have two older brothers. I learnt to handle a shotgun at a very,
very, very early age, far earlier than I learnt to drive. It has
been part of my education—my life's education—in how
to handle them. Does that stop me wanting to do that with my children?
I have a daughter and a son. No. My son is seven. He will eventually
inherit and I will teach him to shoot. When? I don't know. But
it hasn't put me off wanting to pass on my experience to my children.
Q152 Mr Burley:
But do you see a difference between that experience, a very formal,
practical father-led tuition of how to handle a firearm, and the
unsupervised computer game, ultra violence that your son could
equally be playing when you're not supervising him in a practical
sense? Does that worry you more?
Mr Berger: He races
cars so he doesn't—to be fair, we don't have those games
in the house. That's not because I necessarily don't want them.
I'm not into them, so he's not into them. It is a classic father/son
relationship.
Q153 Mr Burley:
You can understand when some experts say that's almost more dangerous
because they're unsupervised, left to these very violent video
games, as opposed to the more paternal practical handling of a
shotgun that you would—
Mr Berger: Okay.
I don't want to be drawn on that one. To be honest with you, I've
never played them, I don't have any experience of them.
Q154 Nicola Blackwood:
There is little doubt that there is a significant culture at the
moment that glamorises gun use, whether it is rap music or film
industry or video games, and children from all backgrounds have
regular access to this. Many do not have practical experience
of gun use in a positive way. Do you think that there is a way
that we can be better educating that age group about the consequences
of gun use, rather than merely about the image of gun use?
Dr Chrystie: It
may have been at one of your last meetings, or it may have been
something else I read, but I recall, I think it was a teacher
who had devised lessons in the use of guns for—I cannot
remember what age of children—and her experience was that
when presented with imitation firearms they waved them around
in exactly the same way as Harry's children would not because
they have been properly trained, but they waved them around in
much the same way as they do on video games. Having been through
a number of lessons, they then recognised the correct way to use
a firearm. I don't know whether that answers or informs your deliberations
in any way and of course the fact that they were then able to
use a firearm, rather than not, has its own disadvantages.
Q155 Nicola Blackwood:
What would be your view, Ms Talbot, if such events happened in
your school?
Ms Talbot: I think
it could be covered under the PSHE Citizenship Curriculum. It
probably already is in some form. It is a difficult one. It's
do we leave things to parents or does the state try to interfere
in parenting? I think it could be covered under the PSHE Curriculum.
I think also it's to do with the wider society and the children's
feelings of citizenship, and even their understanding of what
actually happens. At a young age—primary age—they
don't understand what happens because on the video games the people
get up again.
Q156 Mark Reckless:
We heard from Ms Talbot about guns not being appropriate in a
dwelling but then the reference, perhaps from Mr Berger, to guns
being perhaps more entrenched in rural communities than urban.
Is it practical, do you think, to have a distinction between no
guns in dwellings but farmers being allowed to have guns in, say,
outbuildings?
Ms Talbot: Well,
currently, the police come and check where the guns are kept,
so it would be secure. The police would make it so as part of
the licensing. I think it's reasonable to have guns in an outbuilding
in a rural community. As I said before, it's not reasonable to
keep them in a house, I don't think, but in an outbuilding that
would be fine.
Q157 Dr Huppert:
I was very struck by Dr Chrystie's analysis in comparison with
the idea of car licensing. In both cases you have something which
plays a very important role but can also be lethal, leading to
many deaths and I think the number of deaths from cars is rather
greater than what we're considering. Is this analysis, and way
of thinking about the problem, something you think this Committee
should pursue further or is it a red herring?
Dr Chrystie: Are
you asking me?
Dr Huppert: Anybody who
has thoughts on it. You suggested it, so—
Dr Chrystie: I
threw it out. I'm not sure whether it is a red herring or not.
It would have, I'm quite certain, the effect of reducing the number
of licences and the number of weapons because people would not
bother to undertake whatever training was required.
Chair: Thank you very much, Mr Chrystie.
Ms Talbot, Mr Moore, Mr Chrystie and Mr Berger, thank you very
much for coming. This must have been a very difficult experience
for you. Can I reiterate the deep sympathy of the Members of this
Committee and our thanks. It's not easy to get down to London
from Cumbria. I know, because I've driven up to Cumbria to meet
witnesses that are coming before the Committee shortly and it's
a very long way for you. We are extremely grateful, and we hope
that we will, in some way, provide you with some of the information
that you clearly need in order to know precisely what happened
on 2 June. Thank you very much for coming.
Dr Chrystie: May
I have a few seconds to thank you, sir, and your Committee for
turning what could have been a fairly traumatic experience into—from
my point of view, anyway—a very informative and almost enjoyable
one.
Chair: Thank you very much. Not many
witnesses say that to us I have to tell you.
Dr Chrystie: You
were very kind.
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