GCN welcomes the APPG’s recommendation to universalise the minimum age for unsupervised possession and use of airguns to 17 years. Furthermore we urge the government to introduce an enforceable licensing system for all new purchases and a ban on the sale of airguns except through Licensed Firearms Dealers.
The government continues to treat airguns as a ‘nuisance’ and fails to appreciate their lethality. Children are regularly injured and occasionally killed by airguns, and thousands of animals and birds are killed and maimed every year. Perhaps airguns were once, in a gentler age, just toys for boys, but in the current environment of increasing gun crime and a growing gun culture this no longer pertains. Airguns are not toys – they are lethal weapons and should be treated as such. We welcome the APPG’s recommendation that the courts take airgun misuse more seriously.
So just how many people have been killed by airguns?
I have never seen such bigotted hatred for a minority group (legitimate shooters).
Why don't they campaign to ban cars? They are perfectly safe when used legitimately but more people die from their misuse than through firearms in the UK and being an 'accident' is no excuse for a firearm so why must this be so for a car?
This highlights so brilliantly what's wrong with this nation, we can't do the mature thing and try and deal with an issue maturely, we have to try and destroy it. Anybody care to consider that policy in the light of the drug situation in the Uk compared to say, Holland?
I play a Fender bass, I shoot a springer. I like things to be, well, dependable