Politicians in communities affected by mass shootings are calling for tighter firearm restrictions amid the growth of practical shooting clubs. SNP MP Alyn Smith, who represents Dunblane, and Luke Pollard, the Labour MP for Plymouth, want an overhaul of existing gun laws and a ban on pump-action weapons.
Campaign group Gun Control Network are meeting with the Home Office next week over the new weapons and practical shooting clubs. It comes after a Sunday Mail investigation uncovered a loophole in firearms laws that means new US-inspired gun clubs don’t fall under the strict licensing laws.
Today marks the 25th anniversary of the UK’s handgun ban after the Dunblane shootings where 16 primary school kids and their teacher were killed by a gunman in 1996. Last year licensed gun owner Jake Davison, 22, shot and killed five people in Ply-mouth before shooting himself.
Pollard said: “We recognise that a comprehensive ban on a class of weapon and gun works. So now, just as we banned handguns after Dunblane, we need to ban pump-action weapons after Plymouth.”
The Sunday Mail discovered that anyone with a licence for certain types of guns is able to set up so-called “practical shooting” clubs on private land without the need for police, government or local authority permission and licensing.
That is despite members – including those at a Lanarkshire club – using high-powered guns as they move their way around a combat assault course to take out human-shaped targets. New members without any gun experience or licences can take part in shooting.
Recoil Scotland, based in Shotts, runs practical shotgun, mini rifle and long-barrel pistol disciplines.
In Scotland a shooting club which uses three types of weapons – full-bore rifles, small-bore rifles and muzzle-loading pistols – must apply for approval from the Scottish Government. But practical shooting clubs which do not use these weapons fall outside the approval powers.
Smith has written to Home Secretary Suella Braverman and Scotland’s Justice Secretary Keith Brown urging the loophole in firearms laws be closed.
Smith, SNP MP for Stirling, said: “What the Sunday Mail has done to bring this issue to light shows me that these laws need to be fine-tuned. The enforcement and sort of guns that are available does need to be kept under constant review and we need to learn the lessons of any misuse.”
Gill Marshall-Andrews, chair of Gun Control Network, said: “No one really knows how many of these ranges and clubs really exist. The Home Office and police don’t know.”
Recoil Scotland, Firearms UK (which campaigns for the protection of firearms ownership) and The Practical Shooting Association did not respond to our requests for comment.
A Scottish Government spokesperson said:“Firearms law is a reserved matter, with the exception of air weapons, and would be for the UK Government to amend.”
A Home Office spokesperson said:“The UK has some of the strictest gun controls in the world but we keep them under constant review.”
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