Firearms Control

UNCORRECTED TRANSCRIPT OF ORAL EVIDENCE    To be published as HC 447-ii

HOUSE OF COMMONS

ORAL EVIDENCE

TAKEN BEFORE THE

HOME AFFAIRS COMMITTEE

FIREARMS CONTROL

TUESDAY 26 OCTOBER 2010

PROFESSOR PETER SQUIRES

TOM DAVIES and JANE FURNISS

JOHN BATLEY, GRAHAM DOWNING and MIKE EVELEIGH

USE OF THE TRANSCRIPT

Oral Evidence

Taken before the Home Affairs Committee

on Tuesday 26 October 2010

Members present:

Keith Vaz (Chair)

Nicola Blackwood

Mr Aidan Burley

Lorraine Fullbrook

Dr Julian Huppert

Steve McCabe

Alun Michael

Bridget Phillipson

Mark Reckless

Mr David Winnick

In the temporary absence of the Chair, Mr David Winnick was called to the Chair for part of the meeting.

Examination of Witness

Witness: Professor Peter Squires, University of Brighton, gave evidence.

Q49 Mr Winnick (in the Chair): Thank you very much, Professor Squires, for coming along as part of our inquiry into firearms control. Obviously, there will be a number of questions for you to answer. Our time is rather limited, because we have a number of witnesses today. You are the second witness, and you are giving evidence on a topic different from that of the witness we’ve just heard from.

You have taken quite an interest in gun control, and, obviously, that is the reason for your giving evidence to the Home Affairs Committee today. Do you, first of all, feel that there’s any argument whatsoever for loosening the controls as far as gun licences are concerned?

Professor Squires: Absolutely not. I think that it’s bizarre that, in the wake of an incident such as Cumbria, anyone would seem to think so. It’s bizarre that we are seeing arguments for loosening controls or synthesising them at a lower standard. I think that is quite perverse.

Q50 Mr Winnick (in the Chair): In your very interesting paper you make the point that, following Dunblane and the recent tragic incident in Whitehaven, the mass murderers all had licences to carry guns. Is that the position?

Professor Squires: That is absolutely the case. In the paper, I go back further than that to the evidence submitted by the Home Office to Lord Cullen’s inquiry in 1996. A supplementary analysis was made of gun homicides that showed that 14% of gun homicides are committed with licensed firearms. If you take that picture further and look at domestic homicides, 18 out of 60, nearly a third of domestic homicides, which are often a continuation of domestic violence, are committed with licensed weapons.

Many people would like to state a position that there is a clear, watertight differentiation between legal and illegal weapons, but that is not the case. I’d go even further and say that most gun crime in Britain is committed with weapons that are licensed or otherwise legal. For instance, roughly half of gun crime is air weapon crime. Such weapons are not illegal and they are part of a much bigger and more complicated problem that we need to look at in a much more complicated and systematic manner.

Q51 Mr Winnick (in the Chair): This has always been one of the most controversial topics, because, whatever gun control legislation has been brought in by whichever Government, there has always been quite a lot of opposition outside Parliament. So, are you not surprised that there are those who want to see a relaxation of the current laws?

Professor Squires: Of course I am not surprised. There is a shooting lobby in this country and, on every occasion that the issue is discussed, they come to argue, sometimes with a usual list of what I feel are half-truths, confusing evidence and a series of vested interests.

I have studied this independently, as an academic-much like your previous speaker. I think there are three contributions to make. The first relates to evidence, which I have already alluded to. The second is a question about horizon scanning and looking at what the issues coming up are-I think we have some serious problems there, too. The third is to ask some of the questions that no-one else asks. That is partly addressed in my current submission. The suggestion, for instance, that people should keep weapons and ammunition in their private homes-where even Lord Cullen’s inquiry suggested they are most at risk from misuse by their owners, or from theft-is something that we seriously need to address. As we have seen, three shooting outrages, 14% of gun crime and one in three domestic firearm homicides were committed with legal weapons, which is a problem that we have to take seriously.

Mr Winnick (in the Chair): Thank you. I hope you understand that we have quite a large number of witnesses today, to the extent that my colleagues, including myself, are being relatively brief. If you are too, it would help us to make progress. Mr Reckless has a brief question.

Q52 Mark Reckless: Professor Squires, I am slightly confused. I thought you said just now that 14% of homicides were committed with licensed firearms. The Cullen data that we have here say that between 1992 and 1994, only 9% of homicides were committed with firearms at all. Only 14% of those 9% were with licensed handguns. There seems to be a huge disconnect in the data, wouldn’t you say?

Professor Squires: Fourteen per cent. of firearm homicides were committed with legal, licensed firearms.

Mark Reckless: Firearm homicides. You said "homicides" initially, I believe.

Q53 Bridget Phillipson: Many of the submissions that we’ve received have argued that the UK already has some of the most stringent gun controls in the world. What do you think about that? Do you agree?

Professor Squires: I think they’re true, but we have a veritable patchwork of controls that have arisen for a range of reasons, in a range of situations. We have not, in this country, anticipated the massive shift in the illegal gun stock in this country. That now clearly includes imitation weapons, BB guns, a whole range of weapons designed to fire CS gas cartridges, and the problem of conversions and reactivations. It is a multi-layered problem, and we need a systematic overview of it.

We didn’t anticipate this; I mentioned earlier the important role of social science in doing some of this horizon scanning. People were saying in the early ’90s that the problem of imitations, conversions and reactivations was already an issue for the country. It took us 10 years to legislate on it. I hope we won’t take another 10 years to do something about the problem as it is today.

Q54 Dr Huppert: Can I follow up on what you were just saying, because it is actually what I was hoping to ask you about? In your submission, you talk extensively about replica weapons, convertible weapons, reactivated weapons and weapons brought back by soldiers as well, as a side route. How much do you think we should be focusing on those routes and what we can do about them, rather than on discussing licensed firearms themselves?

Professor Squires: It is all part of a similar picture. We should certainly be addressing those routes because they are the problem of gun crime in the streets, but I don’t think the problem of licensed weapon misuse is insignificant and it needs to be part of a wider consideration. Around 1,000 weapons are stolen from private homes. They immediately become part of the complicated problem of guns on the street. Shotguns are sawn off, weapons are converted, and weapons are smuggled home. There are many trickles and I don’t think there is one particular trickle I would concentrate on. We need a rather more concerted look across the board.

Q55 Dr Huppert: Given that there is a lot of legislation on replica, convertible and reactivated weapons already, what new legislation do you think might be useful?

Professor Squires: I have suggested in the evidence that, in relation to converted weapons, we need to work more closely with Europe and address the production, supply and distribution of a whole range of new CS gas weapons that are trickling their way into this country. That seems to me to be an important issue. The Forensic Science Service now says that converted weapons are becoming its largest crime gun referral for analysis. A recently published survey stated that it is 21%-the largest single category-of weapons that it now deals with, and it is fuelling the problem of gun crime on our streets.

Q56 Lorraine Fullbrook: Professor Squires, I would just like to ask a supplementary question. There are hundreds of thousands of responsible gun owners in this country who use weapons responsibly and store them responsibly. How would you filter the illegal firearms out from the hundreds of thousands of people who are responsibly using firearms for leisure or in their work?

Professor Squires: I wouldn’t go about it that way. I would simply suggest that I have absolutely no problem, as you say, with the responsible use of firearms in agriculture and in sport. I know that many people who like to have weapons like to keep them at home, and that is part of the essence of being a gun owner. I do not think, however, that they should have large supplies of ammunition available at home. The problem of the use of ammunition in agriculture can be treated as part of a job, and for sport shooters attending events, the ammunition should come to the event. The problem is not of firearms in the home, but ammunition and firearms together.

Q57 Lorraine Fullbrook: How sensible is it for hundreds of thousands of people, particularly in agriculture, who live on large farms, for example, to travel miles to get their ammunition to come back to their land? How practical is that?

Professor Squires: How else do they get large quantities of seed or fertiliser? I would order it.

Q58 Lorraine Fullbrook: But they order it in bulk.

Professor Squires: Yes, and when they use it, they return the surplus. We are on practicalities here. Some chap on a radio show, who talked to me about how he woke up one morning and wanted to go shooting rabbits, felt that it was very inconvenient. I don’t think that public safety should be put aside for the convenience of a farmer.

Q59 Mr Winnick (in the Chair): Arising from what Mrs Fullbrook has said, you don’t believe that there is any particular problem for the agricultural community.

Professor Squires: I am sure they will say that there is a problem. I am sure it is a problem that can be overcome if we are serious about taking public safety seriously.

Q60 Mr Winnick (in the Chair): Along the lines that have been indicated, what do you mean when you say "overcome"?

Professor Squires: That when a farmer or a land agent wishes to undertake some shooting, the ammunition is provided, quantified and used, and any surplus is returned, which would occur in the context of an organised shoot.

Q61 Lorraine Fullbrook: What percentage of accidents have happened with agricultural or leisure use? You are talking about public safety. Can you give me examples and numbers of accidents that have happened with legally held firearms and with responsible use, for agriculture and for leisure?

Professor Squires: With respect, that is not what I have been talking about.

Q62 Lorraine Fullbrook: You mentioned public safety.

Professor Squires: I have been talking about public safety in relation to domestic homicides and spree shooting. They have all involved people who had access to a weapon and access to ammunition. My concern has not been accidents at shooting events at all. I am quite sure that there are a few.

Q63 Mr Winnick (in the Chair): But if you feel, arising from the questions that have been put more locally over the claims of the agricultural community generally, that they are exaggerating, if that is your view, which it seems to be, you could always write to us accordingly, and we would listen, as with all other witnesses, whichever viewpoint they happen to take. So, if you would like to take that as an offer, it is genuinely meant.

Q64 Steve McCabe: I have two quick questions, one of which you have just touched on with Julian Huppert. You have called for a more proactive and preventive approach to the problem of converted weapons. Is there anything more that you want to say about what that means in practical terms? How would we recognise that?

Professor Squires: It means two kinds of things. The first is that some of the contributions of the academic community and the science community could be drawn upon in doing more of what I call horizon scanning to look at the problems. No one was talking about imitation and conversion weapons 15 or 20 years ago when they were surfacing.

Secondly, it means better sharing of data. I made this comment in the evidence that I submitted. The problem of firearms is only scarcely addressed by current gun crime statistics, which clearly only record gun-enabled crime. Possession of illegal weapons is not recorded as a gun crime. We need to have better data and they need to be shared with relevant science communities to take a better look into the future at the emerging-

Q65 Steve McCabe: So is that a call for more accurate recording and greater access to that data? I think that the problem that you cite is that they tend to be held by the authorities and it is difficult to subject them to the academic rigour that I presume you have in mind.

Professor Squires: It is certainly a request for greater sharing. My concern is related to the police authorities and forensic science. I know that we now have NABIS, which is busily filling a gap in our firearms intelligence, but it seems to me that it is late to the party. We need to take a more proactive look. There needs to be more engagement with and access to the available evidence that is already there, which is not being adequately considered.

Q66 Alun Michael: You made a distinction between the dangers that arise from weapons and the issue of ammunition. Another issue is the use of replica weapons in crime. Just as people like to have weapons, people like to be collectors. What has been the impact of the Violent Crime Reduction Act on reducing the use of replica weapons in crime?

Professor Squires: It seems to have bought it down significantly. I say that with the caveat that I don’t think we ever had a very good picture of how many replicas were out there in the first place, but they were rising rapidly until about 2005. In terms of the frequency of their involvement in crime, they have started to drop equally rapidly since 2007. That suggests to me that some forms of intelligent gun control can work, but for a long time they clouded the picture of gun crime in this country and allowed many people to suggest that the legislation after Dunblane had not worked, whereas in fact it had.

Q67 Alun Michael: You have commented on the importance and quality of data. If you are collecting data, it needs to be the right data. Do you have a view of how we should determine what data we collect and how they are analysed?

Professor Squires: It ought not only to emanate from police action, because it is then, rather like the problem of knife crime, a record of how much the police do rather than of what the problem is. The best survey we had in this country was undertaken by colleagues in Portsmouth in a piece of work for the Home Office that looked at the market in illegal firearms, but also went to the lengths of interviewing convicted gun offenders to talk to them about where they got the weapons and how they used them.

I think we need to move the debate on beyond just reports of crime to reports of gun possession, gun transfer and the access that the criminal community has to firearms. It is a more complete picture with that kind of intelligence and I know that it exists. I worked with Greater Manchester Police on a project on gangs and guns. They have intelligence. It is not evidence, but it gives a more complete picture of the multi-layered problem of guns on our streets.

Alun Michael: That is very helpful. Thank you.

Mr Winnick (in the Chair): I now leave you to the tender mercy of Nicola Blackwood.

Q68 Nicola Blackwood: There has been some speculation in the wake of the Raoul Moat shootings that there might be a role for medical assessment prior to the granting of licences. There has been some concern about that from patient groups, which believe that it might breach data protection, and from doctors who feel that they might then be liable for any adverse outcomes. I understand that you are also sceptical about this proposal. Why is that?

Professor Squires: There are important issues about data sharing and I can see that when the police are calling at homes at which there has been an incident, a national firearms database might assist them to know that the householder on whom they are calling has access to a firearm. Officers have been shot at and killed when attending such an incident. I am wary about the legality of that level of data sharing across a range of agencies in the community, and I am not convinced that any health practitioner worth their salt would ever want to get into a crystal-ball gazing exercise to predict anyone’s future mental health. I see that whole issue as something of a red herring. It is not something I have wanted to get into. I think it is of relatively limited value to us in this kind of exercise. My concern has been with the regulation of the instrument, not so much the person.

Q69 Nicola Blackwood: So if you are in favour of strengthening legislation in some way-we have already touched on the issue of storage, which I believe you have quite specific views about, and we have looked at some of the problems with that-do you have any other particular areas in which you think that we should be strengthening legislation prior to licence?

Professor Squires: There is still the problem of the market in deactivated and reactivated weapons. That is a glaring gap in the system of gun controls in this country and why it was never included in the Violent Crime Reduction Act 2006 I do not know. We’ve gone some way to address the problem of conversions. Air weapons which, as I said in my evidence, are responsible over the decade for roughly 10 fatalities and roughly 1,000 serious injuries, need to be brought into the same category of firearm regulation as rifles and shotguns.

Q70 Mr Burley: You mentioned air weapons offences, which have decreased in recent years. I think there was a 19% reduction in 2008-09. Does that represent a real decline in offences and how does that decline relate to recent legislation?

Professor Squires: It’s a complicated picture. I am satisfied that the increase has as much to do with the criminal damage inflation of cost because the majority of air weapon offending is when the weapon is fired and criminal damage results. However, offending by firearm is grossly under-reflected in terms of a whole range of threats, attacks on animals and other criminal damage. But the trend is moving in the right direction. That may well be as a result not so much of firearm legislation but of antisocial behaviour legislation, which has tried to tackle that lower-level nuisance in communities. That is perhaps the solution there.

The whole reason why I got into firearms issues as a criminological question came as a result of a piece of work I was doing for Sussex police in a community in Brighton. We found that lots of neighbours pointed out that their pets had been shot; their doors and windows were peppered with pellet holes; and other people admitted to us that they had bought weapons for personal defence in their homes. There is my horizon scan. We have a problem here if people see this as a genuine solution to safety in communities.

Q71 Mr Burley: A final question: you’ve obviously done a huge amount of work around the issue of firearms and society. You’ve talked this morning about the under-recorded explosion in replicas and reactivated weapons. Do you think that now is the time to consider routinely arming the police in this country?

Professor Squires: No. Part of my concern to address the problem of weapon misuse is a concern that we can retain, as far as possible, unarmed policing by consent. That is a very important principle of British law and order. The more that the police are armed, the more that they will resort to those arms. I heard on the radio this morning a feature about the new anti-terror protocols for the SAS. It seems to me that we are in a situation where there is a kind of gun culture trickling down into our community. I do not think that we are at the point where the police need to be routinely armed to tackle it. They have capacity to respond as the need arises. The number of armed responses is going up quite dramatically, especially in London, and problems arise from that kind of policing. It is more expensive. It is more dangerous. We have to work to prevent that becoming the norm in policing response. So I would say no now. I think the police believe they have the capacity to respond to problems as they see them. We have to avoid the drift towards a more armed society and an armed response capacity to fight it.

Q72 Bridget Phillipson: If I can just return briefly to the issue of the recording of gun crime and data, which you talked about quite a lot. I am aware of incidents where victims of crime feel that either a real or a replica firearm was used in an offence, perhaps to intimidate, but that that offence was not recorded as a gun-related crime because the police were not able to obtain a weapon, recorded as a public order offence, or not even recorded as a crime at all. What do you think about that, and what do you think could be done to improve it? It also raises the question, when individuals know or have good reason to believe that someone is holding a fire arm illegally, of how they would go about ensuring that action is taken.

Professor Squires: In the past, I have worked with Crimestoppers and for a while it had a gun crime hotline. Members of the public could ring in if they felt that someone was in illegal possession. You’re absolutely right. For some years, it has been true that around 40% to 50% of armed robberies are committed with replica or non-firing weapons, even those that have been retrieved at crime scenes and incidents. This is corroborated by testimony from prosecuted armed robbers. They may have a vested interest in saying that, but the problem is clear. It seems to me that in law we have embraced the principle that the victim’s perspective is the one that counts. We have embraced it in relation to hate crime and racist crime. If a victim asserts that they have had a gun pointed at them, whether the gun is real is not necessarily the main issue that they want resolved, but that should be something that the police record.

Mr Winnick (in the Chair): Thank you very much indeed, Professor. That has been very useful indeed. You can rest assured that when our report comes out-I’m not quite sure when that will be-you will receive a copy. It will be of interest to have your comments included. Whether we will disappoint you or not would be premature for me to say at this stage. We all have decided views on what I earlier described as a very controversial topic. Thank you very much.

The meeting will adjourn for a very small time. There is no need for anyone to leave the room.

Examination of Witnesses

Witnesses: Tom Davies, IPCC Commissioner with responsibility for firearms licensing, and Jane Furniss, Chief Executive, Independent Police Complaints Commission, gave evidence.

Mr Vaz took the Chair.

Q73 Chair: I welcome Mr Davies and Ms Furniss as our first witnesses in the firearms inquiry. Do members have any further interests that they need to declare?

Alun Michael: I ought to say that Tom Davies is a constituent of mine and I know him well.

Q74 Chair: Mr Davies, as you know, the Committee is conducting its inquiry into firearms. The IPCC has just completed an investigation into a current issue, that concerning Mark Saunders, the barrister who recently died. Can you enlighten us on any conclusions that you might have about that inquiry?

Tom Davies: Certainly, Mark Saunders’ case has recently gone through its inquest and is now being reviewed by the Crown Prosecution Service, but many facts during the course of the inquest came out that may be pertinent to the inquiry that you are doing here on firearms licensing. A little background is that Mark was a lawyer who lived in Markham square in London. He went home one evening after being out for the day and started firing a firearm out of his window. A siege ensued for some four hours and at the end of it, sadly, Mr Saunders was shot by the Metropolitan police. During the siege, Mark fired three times out of his window; shots that, on one occasion, went into the house of a neighbour that was back to back with his house.

Of particular relevance to this inquiry might be the fact that Mark was a licensed firearms holder. He lived in a highly populated area and had obtained his licence in September 2006. In the run-up to his licence application, which he applied for in August of that year, he had been in the hands of a consultant treating him for depression and for a tendency occasionally to drink more than a sensible limit; he had been referred there by his GP. Sadly, on his application for a firearms licence, he filled the form in saying that he had no such health problems. You may be aware that those questions are asked on the application for a licence.

The case was only one of about a dozen that have come to our attention over the six years that I have been in this role. One has to put it into the context of it being a very, very rare occurrence for a large number of licences.

Q75 Chair: It would be helpful if there were conclusions that are relevant to the inquiry, if you could write to us with that information. On the process that you’ve discussed, was the process for the application of a licence properly conducted?

Tom Davies: Yes, the inquiries about the purpose of having a firearm, the security that was to be afforded it in his own home-the main questions that are asked-and a reference for his suitability went through a proper process, as did the only check that they could make medically, which was if something came out and they could then go and ask the doctors.

Q76 Chair: Why did the IPCC decide to begin an investigation into firearms licensing in 2007?

Jane Furniss: As Tom says, there is a requirement for police forces to refer matters to us when someone dies following contact with the police. That is irrespective of whether any member of the public makes a complaint, so where a person dies or is seriously injured. We’d become aware of a small number of cases where, as a result of the misuse of a licensed firearm, either the holder themselves had died at their own hands or at the hands of the police and/or they had killed someone else-another member of the public. It became evident to us that there was an issue about whether the system was working; that was our question. In the cases that we investigated, we discovered that there was a great deal of information about the person’s previous behaviour that should have alerted the licensing officer in the police to concerns. Those were people who had firearms licences despite the fact that they were regularly drinking to excess, which had led to their being convicted or behaving in a violent manner towards other people in their family or neighbourhood. Such behaviour should have fallen under the words in the Act detailing those of "intemperate habits or unsound mind". Any of you looking at those cases will conclude that those individuals fell into that category, and, for whatever reason-the reasons were different in the different cases-it hadn’t come to the attention of the licensing officer.

Q77 Chair: So what were your recommendations? When you made your recommendations, were they followed up by the then Government?

Jane Furniss: What we recommended didn’t require legislation. What we worked on with the Association of Chief Police Officers and the Home Office was an improved system for the guidance that underpins the firearms Act. So it was about how the information is gathered by the officer making the licensing decision.

Q78 Chair: But was that practice followed?

Jane Furniss: It has been in part, but not finally. One of the things that we suggested was that officers should take into account behaviour that falls short of a conviction, which has been implemented. There is a system, the national firearms licensing management system, that allows them to do that.

Q79 Chair: What about the bits that weren’t enacted?

Jane Furniss: The key piece that hasn’t yet been finalised is the issue of sharing information from the medical profession.

Q80 Chair: What’s the hold-up?

Jane Furniss: I think that "hold-up" isn’t quite the right phrase.

Q81 Chair: But it’s been three years since you made your recommendations, hasn’t it?

Jane Furniss: No, we started the work in 2007 and concluded it about a year later. The hold up is a dispute over the best way of sharing such information and the properness of doing it.

Q82 Chair: Who is involved in that dispute?

Jane Furniss: The discussion is between the BMA and the Association of Chief Police Officers. The Information Commissioner has raised concerns about the propriety of using medical records for a matter that is not necessarily related to the health of the individual. It would be wrong to suggest that anyone is getting in the way of making it happen, because there is a proper discussion about the balance between privacy for the individual and the risk that is posed by that person.

Q83 Chair: You made recommendations two years ago. Some of those recommendations have been implemented, and some have not been implemented because there is an ongoing discussion between various agencies. Is it a never-ending discussion, or does it have a timetable?

Jane Furniss: I think that there is an intent to resolve the matter. Your Committee will help, which is one of the things that we said in our submissions.

Chair: Good. That’s nice to know, thank you.

Q84 Mark Reckless: I was just going to note that there seems to be a body-I don’t know whether it is a trade union or a representative body-for the senior police on one side and the doctors on the other side. Wouldn’t it be more appropriate for elected and accountable politicians to give a view on this?

Jane Furniss: I think that that would be very helpful. It wouldn’t be quite correct to characterise ACPO as a trade union, but it will speak for itself when it comes here to give evidence.

Q85 Alun Michael: It is a very strong trade union.

Jane Furniss: I’ll leave that to your judgment, but there is certainly a role for Parliament in this, whether it is through legislation or expressing a view on the guidance.

Q86 Nicola Blackwood: I think that all of us in this room have in mind certain tragedies involving guns, which have prompted this inquiry, but it would be helpful for the Committee to have some idea of the detail of the cases that led you to start your 2007 investigation, so that we can have some idea of the problems that you identified and the lessons that you have learned.

Jane Furniss: In a second, Tom can give you some detail of the individual cases. If I can very briefly set that in context, we receive some 2,500 referrals each year from the police under the Police Reform Act 2002, which requires the police to make a referral where a death or serious injury has occurred, or a criminal offence has occurred. Of those 2,500 referrals a year during our six-year life-so something in excess of 15,000 referrals-only about 25 or 30 have involved the misuse of a licensed firearm. So-it’s important to keep this in context-the probability of that happening is small, but when it does happen there can be deadly consequences, which is why we were concerned to see whether there were general lessons to be learned from the cases that we investigated.

Tom Davies: With that caveat in mind, perhaps I could highlight two cases that were detailed in our submission.

Q87 Chair: Yes, you can, Mr Davies. You can always write to us and we will consider the cases, but you can now give us the highlights.

Tom Davies: In one a man living in an urban area was arrested peacefully at the end of a similar siege during which he fired 53 shots, 17 of them at a police van where police officers were trying to get people out of the area. He had eight guns, which had been taken off him over a period of years and subsequently reinstated by magistrates. The process, both of his discharging his duty to say he had a medical condition and of bringing the intelligence together through the police forces, was not tied up as well as it might have been, and we have lessons to learn from that.

The second case, of a similar nature but sadly resulting in death, was the very sad death of Tania Moore in the midlands. Again, the cocktail of medical records from previous years, which might have given an indication of a lack of stability, were not fed in by the applicant and were not then picked up by the police. Neither were several behaviours, among them threatening and matters of harassment, which had a relationship to the final act of his shooting Tania Moore.

Chair: Thank you. Further details in writing would be very much appreciated.

Q88 Bridget Phillipson: How commonly do you think that firearms licences are held by people who perhaps should be regarded as unfit to hold them? What do you think about the systems in place and the response of the police when they receive reports that someone’s mental state and well-being are no longer as they should be to hold a licence?

Tom Davies: I am not in a position to answer the first one. I am well aware that through the very good works of people who run the shooting lobbies-their education, their restrictions on their members and their following good practice are commendable-out of hundreds of thousands of licence holders, we only have a very few, very highly impactive cases.

There are two areas in which things might tighten up. First, as we have said already, if people who applied knew that what they said about their medical condition would be checked as a matter of course-that is what we have put forward as our submission-that might improve the situation.

Secondly, if the kind of decision making that is done by the 43 individual licensing officers across the police forces in England and Wales were carried out to guidance with more consistency in it-again, this Committee can help greatly in developing that-it might enable them, without too much bureaucracy, to put in the right kind of safeguards. When they are judging these people from reports about whether they can be deemed suitable to hold a licence, it is often on the basis of intelligence rather than convictions. There are various other parts of the police disclosure unit that are far more sophisticated than firearms licensing departments in bringing that information and intelligence together. We have some suggestions to make about that on the basis of our cases.

Q89 Bridget Phillipson: If I could ask a question on a slightly different topic, you talked earlier about the cases that have informed your approach and some of the recommendations you have come to. In terms of domestic violence-again, there have been a number of tragic cases where the police have been called but the response has not been allowed for whatever reason-for example, the protection and safety of officers-what kind of comfort or reassurance could victims of firearms offences take that, when they call the police, the police will actually come? While I am sure that the individual officers are mindful of their safety, they will equally want to do their jobs and protect the public.

Tom Davies: That is a very pertinent relationship that we have found; domestic abuse is often a precursor to many of our cases that end up in this kind of violence. There are many other indicators, of course, that sadly people who get into this difficulty also hit other buttons that the police are looking for.

On domestic abuse, most police forces are now putting in a more sophisticated method called DASH, for every case that is reported. As I am sure you know, a case of domestic violence in a household is reported nearly every minute of the year, and for every one a short form must be completed by the officer who goes to it. Whether it results in an arrest, a conviction or being forgotten or not dealt with, whatever happens those forms are cumulative, and other people go back and take more time to go into the domestic violence that is reported in that very quick incident. A similar process could be gone with for firearms licensing, but not with these large numbers in so few cases. Some mix between what happens with domestic abuse, as an indicator, and what happens in the rare cases of firearms might be of help to the police. I know that the Association of Chief Police Officers will develop that theme with you when it gives evidence.

Q90 Bridget Phillipson: I’m aware that, sometimes, there is scepticism on the part of police officers to believe victims that a firearm may be held by an individual, particularly in areas where you might not expect firearms to be held-constituencies like mine. Sometimes there is a reluctance to accept that individuals can have access to firearms, which are sometimes legitimately held, but often not legitimately held. Victims don’t necessarily feel that those reports can be followed up.

Tom Davies: If it would help, I can send details of the case of Mr Munt, who lived in Canvey Island, where domestic violence was the indicator, and where his family didn’t believe it would be followed up, and I can also send further details of the Tania Moore case, both of which follow into that category and may be of guidance to the Committee.

Chair: If you could do that, that would be very helpful.

Q91 Mr Winnick: Hungerford, Dunblane, Whitehaven, Mark Saunders. In all those cases, those responsible for mass murder-although not Mark Saunders, where the victim was himself-had authorised gun licenses. Isn’t it a matter of concern that unsuitable people-leading on from the question that my colleague has just asked you-are given permission to hold guns? In all those tragedies, the victims lost their lives as a result of someone, a mass murderer, who had perfectly legal permission to hold and possess guns.

Tom Davies: That is an observation that can be made. We have already put it in the context, as I am sure others will, that there are almost 1 million license holders.

Q92 Chair: It is a fact. It is not an observation. Mr Winnick is stating a fact. People have died in those circumstances.

Tom Davies: Of course they have.

Q93 Chair: And the people who have had the weapons are unfit, exactly as he said.

Tom Davies: There are similar restrictions to safeguard vulnerable young children, and there are similar restrictions on people who hold poisons. In the case of firearms licensing, thankfully these cases in this country are very few and far between. We hope that our investigations will show some indication of how it can be tightened up. Of course, it is thoroughly and rightly in the hands of parliamentarians to get the proportionality involved in the argument that you are putting forward.

Q94 Mr Winnick: Few and far between, but if they were our loved ones who had died-

Tom Davies: Exactly.

Q95 Mr Winnick: We would take the same view as those who have survived and found that their loved ones were murdered. There are certain lessons to be learnt, looking into the question of firearms, about why such people as those responsible for the tragedies that I have mentioned were allowed to have licensed guns in the first place.

Jane Furniss: Exactly as you say, it is a small number of people but when it goes wrong, it goes wrong in very tragic ways-people die or are seriously injured. The difficulty is separating those cases that, with the benefit of hindsight and information, should have been dealt with better in the first place, and those where it appears that there was no information prior to the incident that would have led anyone to believe that it would happen. That is the essence of making a risk assessment, isn’t it?

Chair: Indeed. Thank you very much.

Q96 Mr Burley: There is an issue of people not disclosing all the relevant medical information that they should do. I don’t think that anyone here would dispute that having it checked for factual accuracy as a matter of course is a sensible suggestion. One would encourage people to actually put the truth on their forms. In terms of their assessment about someone’s mental fitness or otherwise to hold a gun, what response would you expect from the GPs when they get this automatic request for information? If they have a patient whom they see once or twice a year, who has a history of depression or who has been involved in alcohol abuse or was a recreational drug user 10 years ago, what are you expecting from that GP in terms of assessing that person for fitness to hold a firearm?

Jane Furniss: It was clearly not asking them to assess the person for fitness to hold a firearm. That has to be the job of the officer making the licensing or revocation decision. We simply said that the officer doing that needs to know whether the information that they have been given is full and accurate. The question to the GP was not whether they were suitable to hold firearm licences, but whether the information provided by Aidan Burley is accurate and whether there is anything else we should know to take into account when making the judgment. We don’t think that GPs are in a position to make that kind of assessment or prediction of how someone might behave.

Q97 Mr Burley: Are you making any recommendations in terms of how the licensing officers judge the factual information that comes from the GPs?

Jane Furniss: There is quite good guidance for the officer to use to come to their judgment, but we also think that they could be given further help, and drawing on cases that have gone wrong-looking at some of the behaviour-is one of the ways that they can do that. In the past, it wasn’t regarded as a relevant fact that someone had been convicted of drink-driving when they applied for a firearms licence. The guidance now says that it should be, because the indications are that the person may drink to excess and that they break the rules. Those are two important facts for the licensing officer to know. Similarly, a history of depression does not mean in itself that someone is going to misuse their firearm, but behaviour with links to their depression may suggest that they are not a suitable person. So it isn’t a simple question of asking the GP to judge their suitability.

Chair: Mr Burley, are you done?

Mr Burley: Yes.

Q98 Steve McCabe: I guess that the simple argument for tagging medical records is that it would mean that significant medical information could not be overlooked and that the individual could not choose to withhold it. The British Association for Shooting and Conservation, however, object to this, and I think that the Information Commissioner has recently raised some concerns. What is your response?

Jane Furniss: The tagging option was not our proposal. Our proposal was checking and verifying. It was a discussion that followed between ACPO and the medics that suggested tagging. The benefit of that, of course, is that it is enduring and not a one-off process. If the GP knows that I am a licence holder and I start to behave in a way that causes concern, the GP can let the police know. That is the benefit. The risk and danger is that it is an infringement of my privacy and the use of the medical record. I would return to my earlier point and say that that is a matter for parliamentarians to judge rather than us.

Q99 Steve McCabe: I think that the argument of those who raised the concerns is that the number of incidents is far too small. Do you have any independent information? Is that accurate?

Jane Furniss: What we know about is incidents in which a firearms licence holder misuses their firearm in a way that leads to the police being called and death or serious injury occurs. However, there may be quite a lot of incidents in which a licence holder misuses his or her gun in public, but the police peacefully resolve it, so there is no death or serious injury. We don’t know about those, because they are not referred to us. What we know is that serious injury occurs in a very small number of cases. We are talking about something like 30 cases referred to us over a six-year period, so it is small.

Q100 Mark Reckless: We have heard the case for extending the guidance for refusing a licence to include bind-overs and potentially uncorroborated reports of aggressive and disturbing behaviour. Is it fair to refuse a licence on that basis, and is it realistic or sensible to expect officers to standardise things on the basis of large amounts of guidance?

Tom Davies: That is the nub of the question that faces you as parliamentarians. The Criminal Records Bureau gets feedback from each police disclosure unit on the processes of safeguarding children and vulnerable adults. It goes through a proper process to make sure that all the questions are asked and answered in a fair way-there is a consistency about it-and that the judgments in which the intelligence is gathered are put through a five-by-five process. That means that the various criteria on reliability and ability answer the question. The crunch question, of course, is whether that process for this number of cases against that number of licences might be overkill. It is one that you, not us, need to take a view on, but we can feed you-I am sure that ACPO can, too-what those processes are in terms of safeguarding children, what other parts of police forces do on disclosure, and the sharing of that information in various parts of the police forces. They are getting far more sophisticated at it and far better at giving it and sharing it. There may be a time for the Home Office guidance on firearms licensing to learn something from those processes and, again, it can feed that into you.

Q101 Chair: Mr Davies and Ms Furniss, thank you so much for coming today. Obviously you have very important information that is relevant to the work of this Committee. Perhaps you could write to us with that information. One question about Cumbria and Northumbria, which has been raised earlier: are you conducting an inquiry into any aspects?

Jane Furniss: We are not in Cumbria, but we have been involved in the review that is being conducted by a combination of the force, the association and the NPIA. But we are conducting the investigation of the circumstances in which Mr Moat allegedly killed a member of the public, shot a police officer and then died himself. That is an independent investigation that is ongoing.

Q102 Chair: What is the timetable on that because one of the problems that we have identified as a Committee is that the IPCC reports take a long time to compile?

Jane Furniss: Yes. Quite often our reports don’t take very long but we can’t publish them until after the inquest or any criminal proceedings. Mr Moat’s investigation will be completed before Christmas, but there are then a set of criminal proceedings, including on conspiracy to murder, and at least two inquests to be held. We will have to wait until those are all over before we can publish our report.

Chair: Thank you very much for coming today. We are most grateful.

Examination of Witnesses

Witnesses: John Batley, Gun Trade Association, Graham Downing, Countryside Alliance, and Mike Eveleigh, British Association for Shooting and Conservation, gave evidence.

Q103 Chair: Order. Could I call to the dais the representatives of the Countryside Alliance, the Gun Trade Association and the British Association of Shooting and Conservation? Mr Downing, Mr Eveleigh, Mr Batley, thank you for coming.

This Committee is conducting this inquiry into firearms partly because of recent events but also, generally, we last looked at this matter 10 years ago and we felt that it was appropriate to update our reports and our thinking so that Parliament can look at these issues. Can I start by asking you about the involvement of medical professionals in the way in which these licences are granted? Are you satisfied with the current involvement of medical professionals or do you think that their role should be enhanced?

Graham Downing: At present, when an application is made, the medical professional has the opportunity to comment at any time, both on the application and at any time during the life of the certificate. Likewise, the licensing officer has to seek the-sorry, may I start again?

Chair: Are you all right, Mr Downing? Are you sure?

Graham Downing: Yes. I’m okay, thank you.

Mike Eveleigh: I am an ex firearms and licensing officer myself and firearms and licensing inquiry officer for Merseyside police so I perhaps have a perspective across the whole area. I recall that after Dunblane, the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology made an inquiry into this very matter. Its conclusion was that the system we have at the moment would be the best balance. We would incline to agree with that because we fear that if the sports shooter is suffering from, say, a depression or perhaps his wife dies, he then worries and concerns himself about going to his GP on the grounds that his certificate may be revoked. It may seem a small thing to people who don’t shoot, but it is very important. To have one’s certificate revoked is a very large step for shooters. It takes them out of a sport that gives them relaxation and gets them into the fresh air. It also takes away their socialisation. It also, to a certain degree, makes them a pariah among those people who shoot because-

Q104 Chair: Sure. We will explore the advantages of shooting later, but in terms of the medical profession you are saying that people who may be suffering from some kind of illness may not want to go and voluntarily say this to their GP because their licences will disappear. So you put the onus on the person with the gun, rather than on the doctor. Do you not think that there is an onus on the doctor to intervene and start checking people?

Mike Eveleigh: No, I absolutely agree. I have had discussions with the BMA and ACPO on the matter in earlier days and we have put some guidance out. But yes, it is our concern that it might actually have the counter effect.

Q105 Chair: Sorry, when you say that you put some guidance out, do you mean that that guidance has come from the Home Office, or from your own association?

Mike Eveleigh: My own association, BASC, together with ACPO and the BMA have had meetings because their original guidance on the subject was fractionally flawed. We will be having further meetings.

Q106 Chair: I understand. That is extremely helpful. But that guidance you mentioned-where does that guidance go to?

Mike Eveleigh: It is at the moment only with the BMA, and guidance is to GPs. It is advising them that if there is a problem, then they have to breach confidentiality and tell the police, which we agree with 100%.

Q107 Chair: I understand that. Do you think that it would be helpful-the Committee is looking at its previous report and ways in which we can inform Parliament to improve to the system-if that guidance came directly from the Home Office?

Mike Eveleigh: I think it’s more directed at GPs. It’s really a BMA internal memorandum, rather than anything of that nature.

Chair: Let me bring in Dr Huppert; he wants to ask a supplementary.

Q108 Dr Huppert: I am interested in what you said about the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology having done a report arguing one way or another, because it is very unlike POST to take a stance. I note that in its report it says that it is unable to take a stance pro or anti any of the suggestions, so I am slightly concerned that you are alleging that it is supporting your position.

Mike Eveleigh: When I say that, what I mean is that the result was that its view appeared to be, in this case, that this was a good way to go-one of the ways to go-and then that was accepted and used and is in use today.

Dr Huppert: I’ll read this more carefully and we’ll see. I hope it will be circulated to other members of the Committee.

Q109 Chair: What are the main reasons for revoking a firearms licence and are GPs involved in that? Do you know of examples? Are GPs involved in this process? Mr Downing.

Graham Downing: Yes. The police are required to be alert to any signs of emotional instability in a certificate holder: any suicidal tendencies that they might have; signs of depression; detention under the Mental Health Act 2007; guardianship orders or restriction orders under that Act. In these cases where a certificate holder has mental problems of one sort or another, then quite clearly this is fed back through to the firearms licensing officer. Throughout the life of the certificate the licensing officer has a responsibility to maintain a watch for those particular issues.

Q110 Chair: But it’s a lot of people to have to monitor, isn’t it?

Graham Downing: It’s an awful lot of people who need to be monitored. My concern is that this process could place a huge onus on the general practitioner. The practitioner has this onus placed upon him-a responsibility that is not directly related to his primary concern, which is the health of his patient. I have spoken to a considerable number of GPs and other medical professionals, both members and non-members of the Countryside Alliance. They tell me that their overriding responsibility is to give the best advice and to guard the confidences that their patients give to them.

Q111 Chair: But do you think, Mr Eveleigh, that the problem is that there are a lot of people involved with good intentions, but that each one of them has their own duties of confidentiality or responsibility and it might not be as joined up as it ought to be?

Mike Eveleigh: Yes, I think that would be fair. I would add a little, if I may, in that the process over the years of firearms licensing has become so very complicated. I speak as an ex-police officer-I used to do that job. As a police officer you are forced to look at the shape of the bullet, the way it gets into the chamber, the length of the barrel and the place it is going to used-so many things. It does take away a degree of your time from actually concentrating on the person himself. That is, I think, a problem.

Q112 Chair: So you’re not talking about more regulation, you’re talking about better clarity.

Mike Eveleigh: Yes, I think so.

Q113 Steve McCabe: I just wanted to check something that Mr Downing said. You were stressing the fact that GPs give out information where there are mental problems and so on, which I can understand. What would happen if the GP had information that the applicant was a wife batterer, but the case had not actually come to court? Would that be disclosed? I say that, because someone with a record of violence might be more of a worry holding a licence than someone who has had a mental health problem.

Graham Downing: If a complaint had come to the attention of the police, it would certainly-if the police are working as they should-come to the attention of firearms licensing officers.

Q114 Steve McCabe: Yes, but I’m saying what if it hadn’t come to the attention of the police but of the GP, would you know about it? Would that feed through, or is that something that the GP would protect under confidentiality grounds? There are plenty of cases of wife beating that don’t make it to the police, but the GP often knows.

Graham Downing: It would not necessarily come to the attention of a firearms licensing officer. If the matter had been the subject of a complaint to the police, because the wife or one of her neighbours had gone to the police, the matter would certainly-

Q115 Steve McCabe: If the wife had regularly fallen down the stairs and seen the GP, but never been to the police, you wouldn’t know about that? That is my point.

Graham Downing: No, not necessarily.

Q116 Mr Winnick: You have a legitimate point of view. It may be controversial, but the other side of the argument over gun control is no less controversial. Would it be right to say that any attempt to strengthen the existing law would meet with your disapproval, when it comes to gun control?

Graham Downing: I am not so sure that it’s a question of strengthening law; it’s about strengthening process. What I would like to see is competent, experienced firearms licensing managers with teams of competent, experienced firearms inquiry officers, who all know their parish and know and understand the certificate holders who they are working with. In that way, I would expect that the firearms licensing process would be strengthened.

One of my great fears at present, with the proposed cutbacks of funding within the police service generally, is that if this were to impact on firearms licensing, we are going to see an erosion of the numbers-at least-of firearms inquiry officers and firearms licensing managers. That would cause me great concern.

Q117 Mr Winnick: How do you explain how it is possible that the mass murderers who were responsible for Hungerford, Dunblane and for Whitehaven in Cumbria on 2 June were all given-without any difficulties at all, apparently-a licence to carry guns? In Dunblane, of course, so many children as well as adults lost their lives. Don’t you feel that there is something wrong in a system where, despite more recent legislation after Hungerford and Dunblane, we had Bird in Whitehaven?

Graham Downing: Clearly, something went wrong in those three instances but obviously, we don’t have the reports at the moment of Whitehaven. As the lady and gentleman from the IPCC said earlier, we are looking at a huge number of certificate holders. You are going back 25 years, sir. During that period we have had millions of certificate holders and we have had three instances of mass murder-tragic instances though they may be.

We have also had a number of other murders committed with licensed firearms. What we are trying to do is weed out a few tens from millions and millions of firearms certificate holders. We have 750,000 certificate holders at present, roughly speaking. It is a very difficult process and occasionally the process fails.

Q118 Mr Winnick: Various objections to the medical profession being involved have been suggested to us, because there will be some prejudice on the part of GPs. Do you go along with that?

Chair: Just a quick "yes" here is fine.

Graham Downing: Partially.

Mr Winnick: I think that could be taken as "yes".

Chair: This sounds like coalition-speak.

Q119 Lorraine Fullbrook: I’d like to ask this question to Mr Downing and Mr Eveleigh. We have heard in evidence so far that you are opposed to the agreement by the Association of Chief Police Officers and the BMA in principle, which, of course, is completely different from the IPCC’s proposals. Can you give us an idea of what you believe would be a workable solution to this problem? What would you be happy with in your respective positions?

Chair: Sorry, may I ask both witnesses to give somewhat briefer and pithier answers?

Graham Downing: I think I’ve explained my position, and that is that I would like a further concentration on the licensing process and to ensure that the responsibility for licensing lies where it should, with the firearms licensing officer. I would like to make him better at his job and ensure that the guidance that he is working to is accurate and up-to-date.

Mike Eveleigh: I concur entirely.

Chair: Mr Batley, we will be coming to you, don’t worry. Mr Reckless.

Q120 Mark Reckless: The police state that nationally there are between two and three incidents on average a month involving theft of licensed shotguns. Do you think that that justifies any change to how firearms are stored and, in particular, any suggestion that we should legislate to force them to be stored at clubs rather than ever at people’s homes?

Graham Downing: I think that centralised storage at clubs in the context of countryside shooting-be it recreational shooting by game shooters, wildfowlers or rough shooters or in the agricultural context-is not practical; it is not an issue.

Mike Eveleigh: I can add a little further to that. The theft of firearms is pretty well at its lowest level historically. I don’t have the most recent figures, but certainly, having looked at the proportion of firearms legally held in this country, I know that the proportion of thefts has been falling over the years. I believe that there was a rise last year, but some of that was accounted for by a large organisation having a major problem. The thefts have been declining. There was a co-operative document from the British Shooting Sports Council, the Association of Chief Police Officers and the Home Office on firearms security, which is well respected and used all round the country.

Q121 Dr Huppert: You say that there was an issue with a large organisation losing a large number of weapons. Can you say more about that and about how we prevent similar things from happening again?

Mike Eveleigh: I understand that it may be an administrative loss, in that a large firearms firm had some major problems that were probably administrative, we do not know the full story yet. It was in South Wales. A large number of weapons were unaccounted for on paper, whether they are or not, we don’t know-that is still to come out.

Q122 Dr Huppert: Can you let us know as and when you know more?

Mike Eveleigh: I certainly will, but I do not know whether the police will actually tell me.

Chair: If you can write to us?

Q123 Mr Burley: Mr Batley, your time has come. What checks are placed on firearms dealers and what checks do the dealers carry out to ensure that the weapons they sell will be used legitimately?

John Batley: Certainly. The process for registering a firearms dealer is quite stringent. It is part of the gold standard of our current legislation. First and foremost, you produce a cheque for £150, which will last for three years should you be registered. You then fill in a four-page application form, send it off to your local firearms licensing office. You are put through the police national computer and various other checks, and have to declare whether you have any problems on your application form. You are then visited by a firearms licensing officer; you have an in-depth interview and, should that interview be satisfactory, you will be visited by a crime prevention officer, or what is now called an architectural officer, about the security you will have to provide.

The security is very, very clearly laid down in the Home Office guidance to security 2006, which Mike Eveleigh just mentioned. Should you meet all the requirements, and very often you also have to put in a business plan-in effect all that is dealt with in chapter 16 of the Home Office guidance to the police-and get through all those hoops, you will become a registered firearms dealer. One of the crucial things about becoming a registered firearms dealer is the statutory register. Every single thing that you buy, sell or transfer must, by law, go on the register. That is one of the main methods of checking the legality of everything you buy and sell.

Assume I am a dealer. If somebody wishes to buy something from me, probably a rifle or shotgun-I will deal with airguns in a minute-both those items are on a firearms or shotgun certificate. So you present yourself to the dealer, you present your certificate and the dealer will check the certificate. If he’s in any doubt whatsoever, he can go to the firearms licensing department. If he has any doubt as to the firearm itself-if he feels it may be stolen-he can come to us. We have a contract with the Police Information Technology Organisation. That transaction-the actual transfer-has to be dealt with face to face under the 1997 Act. It must be done face to face. There is no question of internet or any other sale of that nature.

As a dealer, you have to satisfy yourself that the person is bona fide. On his certificate, it will say, in the case of a shotgun certificate, that he is authorised to purchase shotguns. On a firearms certificate, it’s slightly more complex than that. He will have to have what’s known as the right to acquire or purchase entered by the police on his certificate. For a firearms certificate, you require a good reason for each and every firearm. It’s a very stringent process.

If we move on very quickly to airguns, under sections 31 and 32 of the Violent Crime Reduction Act 2006, which came into play in 2007, airguns may only be sold to somebody aged 18 or over, and may only be purchased by an 18-year-old or over. In particular, if they are sold by way of trade or business, this has to be done through a registered firearms dealer.

There is now a new type of registered firearms dealer, which is for airguns only. They’re only allowed to deal with low-powered airguns; there’s some 400 extra dealers dealing in airguns. If you present yourself to a shop and you wish to buy an airgun, the dealer has to satisfy himself, if you are not known to him, of your age. Whatever proof or checks he takes may involve a credit card, a driving licence or a series of questions. We’ve given out guidance on ways of-

Q124 Chair: Thank you, that’s very helpful. If you could let us have the requirements, it would be very helpful. Mr Burley, do you wish to come back on any of those questions?

Q125 Mr Burley: Governments of all colours are very fond of knife amnesties, where you can bring in your knives and put them in a bin, and they show you these big piles. But anecdotally, they have no impact on knife crime, because if someone wants to stab someone, they will always be able to get hold of a kitchen knife. It’s the person doing the action, rather than the knife itself. Do you think having tighter control of guns will reduce the amount of offences carried out using a gun, or is it just the same as knife crime, where it’s more about the person wanting to do the damage, and they will always find a way of getting a gun if they really want to?

John Batley: I don’t think there’s a short answer, but what I would like to say is that gun and firearms legislation is so different from knife legislation-not only ages but all the licensing requirements-that I don’t think there’s a parallel. I think we’re slightly comparing apples and pears. What I would say, very quickly, is that in Scotland they’ve introduced a system where each dealer who wishes to sell knives of a certain type is now licensed. We will get the results of how that’s working and whether it has an effect on knife crime in Scotland in due course.

Q126 Chair: But what you’re saying is that if you want to buy a shotgun, you have to appear in person, face to face?

John Batley: Yes, absolutely.

Q127 Chair: Whoever you are? Even members of the royal family have to turn up and-

John Batley: If you have a certificate. You either have to prove you have a certificate or prove you’re somebody who doesn’t need a certificate, and there are very, very few exceptions.

Q128 Chair: What are the exceptions?

John Batley: Crown servants, diplomats and the like.

Q129 Chair: On the minimum age for a shotgun licence, there isn’t one, is there?

John Batley: No, there isn’t.

Q130 Chair: A child of 10 can have one.

John Batley: Yes. If the firearms licensing department is satisfied that that child may hold a certificate, he may.

Q131Chair: Do you know how many children hold these guns?

John Batley: It’s been the result of a recent parliamentary question, but I’m afraid I don’t have the numbers.

Chair: We’ll find out. That’s one thing we can find out: results of parliamentary questions.

Q132 Dr Huppert: Can I bring you back to some of the recent legislation in this area? I think-I suspect others agree-there are probably too many separate pieces of legislation, and we might want to look at trying to unify some of it so there’s more clarity. Recently, the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 and the Violent Crime Reduction Act 2006, which you mentioned earlier, changed the rules quite significantly. What effect has that had on firearms dealers?

John Batley: On firearms dealers? We’ve actually sold more airguns than we did before it was a requirement to sell however one wanted. The reason for that is that the transaction is now face to face, so there is a lot more involvement. There are no internet sales of airguns any more. In actual fact, the gun trade is doing well. What it requires is for the trade itself to be more proactive in helping and assisting people. This also helps with public safety, of course. The trade is doing well.

Q133 Dr Huppert: How are these Acts actually enforced in reality?

John Batley: Sorry?

Chair: How are the Acts enforced? Any prosecutions?

John Batley: I am afraid I don’t have the answer to that off the top of my head. There are very few prosecutions. The principal number of prosecutions is actually on airguns-airguns that are over-powered, and low-powered airguns drifting over the limit: that type of thing. There is no more evidence that I have seen of shotgun and firearms crime.

Q134 Bridget Phillipson: What do you think the impact would be of licensing all air weapons, both on the trade and on any potential misuse of air weapons?

John Batley: That is a complicated issue. There are several million airguns out there. First and foremost, it would require primary legislation to introduce a form of licensing, which we do not have at the moment, and it does not fit either with shotguns or with rifles. It would be enormously costly and bureaucratic.

My big concern, should this ever be introduced, would be that every single airgun-we are talking about several millions here-nobody knows who they belong to, apart from those that have been bought since the Violent Crime Reduction Act commenced in 2007. There are several million airguns that would require voluntary registration, which would involve an enormous public messaging service. It would be very complicated, and I think what might happen is that you would involve people unwittingly in a criminal act, because they did not know that they had them. Lots of people store them in their attics, garages and places such as that.

Q135 Bridget Phillipson: As you will be aware, unfortunately they are often used to commit criminal offences either by injuring people or by injuring wildlife. In my constituency it has certainly been a big issue, where people have been seriously hurt through the use of air rifles. Equally, they fall into the hands of children; they are not properly stored, and there is no real requirement to store them securely. They are often bought by adults for children.

John Batley: First, the Crime and Security Act 2010, which has not yet been brought into force this year, will make a requirement for safer storage. From the point of view of the Airgun Manufacturers and Trade Association, we have instigated a number of procedures, especially through magazines and articles. We have introduced something called Lock Time, which has made airguns a lot safer than they were five or six years ago. There is a very proactive campaign going on through all the magazines, and the associations, of training.

It is getting a lot better; airgun crime has dropped by nearly half since 2004. The Home Office statistics that I have put in my submission show that. That is partly because of the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003, and partly because of the Violent Crime Reduction Act 2006.

Q136Alun Michael: There is concern about the use of imitation and reactivated weapons in relation to crime, and it can be absolutely frightening for people who are involved in that. Do you have any suggestions for how legitimate replica weapons, and what I am told should be called souvenir deactivated weapons, could be better prevented from falling into criminal hands?

John Batley: I would like, if I may, to take this in two parts. Deactivated firearms are one issue, and blank firers are a completely different, separate issue.

Q137Alun Michael: They may look very much the same to someone who is on the receiving end.

John Batley: They do; I completely accept your point, but from a legislative point of view and a trade point of view they are two entirely different items. As far as deactivated firearms are concerned, we answered a consultation-as did a lot of other people-in 2009 from the Home Office, and the published evidence of deactivated and reactivated firearms being used in crime is absolutely minute. I have some figures here that show nine uses of a deactivated firearm between 2004-08. I would suggest therefore that the vast majority of deactivated firearms, which are controlled by the proof authorities and of course by legislation, are not used in crime. They are held in the hands of serious collectors and various people of that nature.

Q138Alun Michael: There is often a dislocation between the evidence of the amount of crime and the views of the community and the public. What you have said is perhaps not what we see portrayed, particularly in the media, when there are one or other of these minute number of incidents. How do you suggest we deal with that?

John Batley: There have been many suggestions for ways of dealing with deactivated firearms. The principal one that has been offered to us is one of licensing or registration. I feel that would be a hurdle that would be very difficult to tackle.

Alun Michael: So instead of that-

John Batley: I think that education is probably the best route to follow, which would make people more aware of why they are keeping them and why they have them. There is plenty of legislation in place so that they won’t be in a public place, and unfortunately the very small number of incidents involved are a criminal offence. It is difficult to legislate against those who will.

Q139 Chair: As you know, there is currently a shooting going on in Malmö in Sweden where somebody is wandering around shooting people specifically from ethnic minority communities. You may feel that this is outside your box, but do you think that the current level of violent video games, which show a lot of people firing guns at others-I don’t play video games, so I wouldn’t know-has had any effect on the way in which people deal with weapons?

John Batley: Yes, I believe it has. I am quite sure, although I don’t have the evidence to hand, that crime and the use of firearms on television and in violent games and so on have probably had an effect.

Graham Downing: Yes, I would agree entirely with John Batley. If one is presented with a screen and interacts with the individuals on it by shooting at them with lasers, firearms and so on, I can only believe that that will lead a person to be more violent and to want to do it for real.

Mike Eveleigh: My wife is a school nurse and teaches shooting at a school. She finds that once children, particularly boys, come to shoot at first, they behave in almost exactly the same way as they have seen in films or games. They wave the guns about and point them at people, which is an absolute no-no-they are allowed to do it once, but if they do it a second time, they are out. Then, after starting shooting, they realise that this is not real. But I believe that you are absolutely right: if a child gets a gun and decides to act in the way that they have seen and imitate a television programme or computer game, it has an effect.

John Batley: The problem then is that, when those kids don’t go into the formal arenas that you talked about and do not receive supervision, they get replicas or handguns on the street and join gangs, which is where they more closely imitate what they have seen on the Xbox. That is where a lot of the gun crime and street culture comes from.

Mike Eveleigh: Absolutely correct. We even see them imitating the incorrect ways of shooting, such as holding a gun or pistol sideways and so on. They have seen that in the movies.

Graham Downing: There’s a big difference between that and the proper training activities that are undertaken by the shooting associations and clubs, where young people in particular are encouraged to act responsibly and safely, and are given a great deal of tuition in that process. They come out better people as a result.

Chair: Excellent. Thank you very much and thank you for that extra piece of evidence. You are excused.