This is Somerset --
tristan.cork@b-nm.co.uk
The European Union is gunning for the West Country's shooting community because they have an "overwhelming need" to be "seen to be doing something".
That was the view of Dorset-based country sports leader Sir Barney White-Spunner yesterday, who said a new frontier in the threat to widespread gun ownership by the rural community is emerging in the form of the EU commissioner for Home Affairs, a Swedish politician called Cecilia Malmstrom.
Misspelling her name as Maelstrom, Sir Barney claimed the EU commissioner was leading a crusade against legal gun ownership because she "could not do anything" about illegal firearms.
In a letter to members, the executive chairman of the Countryside Alliance warned them that "Ms Maelstrom" was "about to become part of your life if you hold a firearms licence".
He said Mrs Malmstrom was leading a proposal to create an EU-wide Firearms Directive, which would create stricter regulations on the ownership of shotgun licences for West Country farmers, gun clubs, organised shoots, clay shoots and field sports participants.
"You do not have to be a student of history to be aware that the EU has never knowingly under-regulated on any issue, and that the UK Government is peculiarly keen to 'gold plate' any regulation that the EU does bring in," said Sir Barney.
"Given the overwhelming need of politicians to be seen to be doing 'something' it seems that legitimate and legal gun owners are the easy target. It is easy to identify us as we have been licensed to hold the guns we do, it is easy to regulate us as we have no choice but to abide by whatever legislation is in place if we want to be licensed and we are overwhelmingly law abiding so will do whatever we are told."
This week, the EU announced its plans for 2014 and it included consultation on a new Firearms Directive.
"We will be challenging any attempt to reopen the Firearms Directive and impose unnecessary and unjustified restrictions on legitimate firearms owners," said Sir Barney, adding that the Alliance was teaming up with similar organisations from across Europe.
"Protecting citizens from the consequences of illegal firearm trafficking into and within the EU is a perfectly laudable aim and one which, depending on your views on the European project, it might seem perfectly sensible to tackle on a Europe-wide basis.
"When launching her proposals, however, the commissioner chose to focus on incidents where legally held weapons were used in what we all would agree were horrific acts leading to multiple deaths, including those people killed by Derrick Bird in Cumbria in 2010," he added.
"She then referred to 10,000 people killed by firearms in the EU between 2000 and 2010, but made no attempt to define what proportion of those people were killed with legally held firearms and what proportion with illegal weapons," he said.
"If the rest of Europe is anything like the UK you can be certain that the vast majority of gun crime relates to illegally held weapons yet the commissioner referred only to incidents where legally held guns had been misused and conflated deaths caused by legally and illegally held weapons. She was also keen to state that: 'firearms which are legally registered, held and traded get diverted into criminal markets or to unauthorised people', yet only mentioned the possibility that 'many firearms are also illegally imported from Third World countries' as an afterthought," he said. Reported by This is 11 hours ago.
tristan.cork@b-nm.co.uk
The European Union is gunning for the West Country's shooting community because they have an "overwhelming need" to be "seen to be doing something".
That was the view of Dorset-based country sports leader Sir Barney White-Spunner yesterday, who said a new frontier in the threat to widespread gun ownership by the rural community is emerging in the form of the EU commissioner for Home Affairs, a Swedish politician called Cecilia Malmstrom.
Misspelling her name as Maelstrom, Sir Barney claimed the EU commissioner was leading a crusade against legal gun ownership because she "could not do anything" about illegal firearms.
In a letter to members, the executive chairman of the Countryside Alliance warned them that "Ms Maelstrom" was "about to become part of your life if you hold a firearms licence".
He said Mrs Malmstrom was leading a proposal to create an EU-wide Firearms Directive, which would create stricter regulations on the ownership of shotgun licences for West Country farmers, gun clubs, organised shoots, clay shoots and field sports participants.
"You do not have to be a student of history to be aware that the EU has never knowingly under-regulated on any issue, and that the UK Government is peculiarly keen to 'gold plate' any regulation that the EU does bring in," said Sir Barney.
"Given the overwhelming need of politicians to be seen to be doing 'something' it seems that legitimate and legal gun owners are the easy target. It is easy to identify us as we have been licensed to hold the guns we do, it is easy to regulate us as we have no choice but to abide by whatever legislation is in place if we want to be licensed and we are overwhelmingly law abiding so will do whatever we are told."
This week, the EU announced its plans for 2014 and it included consultation on a new Firearms Directive.
"We will be challenging any attempt to reopen the Firearms Directive and impose unnecessary and unjustified restrictions on legitimate firearms owners," said Sir Barney, adding that the Alliance was teaming up with similar organisations from across Europe.
"Protecting citizens from the consequences of illegal firearm trafficking into and within the EU is a perfectly laudable aim and one which, depending on your views on the European project, it might seem perfectly sensible to tackle on a Europe-wide basis.
"When launching her proposals, however, the commissioner chose to focus on incidents where legally held weapons were used in what we all would agree were horrific acts leading to multiple deaths, including those people killed by Derrick Bird in Cumbria in 2010," he added.
"She then referred to 10,000 people killed by firearms in the EU between 2000 and 2010, but made no attempt to define what proportion of those people were killed with legally held firearms and what proportion with illegal weapons," he said.
"If the rest of Europe is anything like the UK you can be certain that the vast majority of gun crime relates to illegally held weapons yet the commissioner referred only to incidents where legally held guns had been misused and conflated deaths caused by legally and illegally held weapons. She was also keen to state that: 'firearms which are legally registered, held and traded get diverted into criminal markets or to unauthorised people', yet only mentioned the possibility that 'many firearms are also illegally imported from Third World countries' as an afterthought," he said. Reported by This is 11 hours ago.