Firearms Controls

Roger Williams Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd September 2013 Westminster Hall

[Grahame M. Morris]

That is an eminently sensible suggestion. I also have a couple of points to put to the Minister that I hope will elicit some consideration in a reply.

[Roger Williams (Brecon and Radnorshire) (LD)]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good suggestion. I am surprised that that is not being done at the moment. I once asked the police to attend at a particular place to prevent a breach of the peace. One of the people involved was later refused a shotgun licence, and blamed me for asking the police to attend. Such things are taken into account.

[Grahame M. Morris]

It is not automatic. One problem is inconsistency in how various police forces go about their task. I was about to ask the Minister about the training of licensing officers. While I welcome the Government’s and his commitment on new guidance, the basic problem is that it is still guidance, not a change in the law as such. When I have sought advice from people who are legally qualified—I have a deal of service in local government, and we often dealt with guidance on housing benefit and so on—the advice that I have got is that the legal status of the revised guidance is the same as that of the old guidance, which was clearly found wanting. We need a change in the law to mandate chief police officers to act in a particular way. We need to toughen up the laws in that area to deal with domestic violence.

One way to address the point made by the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnorshire (Roger Williams) is formal training for police officers who deal with firearms licences. The issue was noted by the coroner in his report on the Horden shootings. No formal training was available to officers in 2006-07 in Horden, where the perpetrator, Michael Atherton, applied for shotgun and firearms licences. More concerningly, it is evident that even today, after the lessons from Horden and other incidents around the country, little formal training is offered to police officers. The expectation is effectively that police officers learn on the job, presumably from more experienced colleagues. That could be hugely problematic and lead to enormous variations around the country.

Despite recognising in the introduction to the revised guidance published in December 2012 that firearms legislation and the subject of firearms generally are complex and highly specialised, the Home Office and Ministers provide no assurances that officers will be provided with suitable training. The guidance states:

“It is not practicable to provide comprehensive training for every police officer on the administration of the Firearms Acts.”

It should be possible. I hope that the Minister will offer some insight or clarification on what training is being made available to officers processing firearms applications. I do not believe that Home Office guidance alone is a suitable replacement for comprehensive training for officers determining firearms applications.

I have raised concerns about training because, like many people to whom I have spoken, I find it difficult to understand how, even with the old guidance that applied before December 2012, Mr Atherton, the shooter in the Horden case, was able to obtain and then retain his firearms; they were revoked for a period in 2006. The Home Office guidance states that consideration should be given to any of the following factors:

“Evidence of alcohol or drug abuse that may indicate that a person is unfit/unsuitable to possess a firearm due to the possible impairment of judgement and loss of self-control…Evidence of aggressive or anti-social behaviour, which may include domestic disputes…Evidence of disturbing and unusual behaviour of a kind which gives rise to well-founded fears about the future misuse of firearms. A pattern of abuse should generally be regarded more seriously than a single incident, although isolated incidents should not be disregarded in the assessment of the person concerned and their fitness to possess a firearm.”

From looking at the case, from talking to the family and the people involved and from looking at the coroner’s and Independent Police Complaints Commission reports, there was clear evidence to suggest that Mr Atherton was unsuitable to possess a firearm. I can detail the reasons.