General election candidates' views on firearms ownership

[Ben1981]

Happy to stand corrected on Camoron's rifle ownership but you people are INSANE voting for Tories who WILL take your guns again ~ either at the behest of a daft, four-person "pressure" group - or, eventually, the EU.

As far as I know none of the EU countries have a handgun ban.

[SevenSixTwo]

Happy to stand corrected on Camoron's rifle ownership but you people are INSANE voting for Tories who WILL take your guns again ~ either at the behest of a daft, four-person "pressure" group - or, eventually, the EU.

As far as I know none of the EU countries have a handgun ban.

Indeed.

Tories. I rest my case...

[Daniel11]

I understand your dislike of the Tories for what they have done to shooters in the past, which in many peoples eyes (myself included) is unforgivable, but you only have to look through the results of the survey to see that Conservative Candidates are overwhelmingly more in support of shooting than any other party besides UKIP.
In Britain, for shooters, there is a simple choice: Vote Tory/ UKIP/ Maybe Liberal Democrats, and keep your property, vote SNP/Labour/Greens/Plaid and lose it. I haven't heard any Tory MPs call for an outright Ban, I have heard such sentiment from other parties.

[Mezzer]

Incompetence and acting under poor advice without respect for facts or the rights of people do not endear me to a group of persons, to be brutally honest.

In agreement with you.

+1

Mezzer

[safetyfirst]

Keeping my guns or not keeping my guns is irrelevant to me in a general election. I'd rather lose my guns and see the rich handing some money over to the poor then keep them and maintain the status quo.

Not that that's actually something you can vote for and have happen, mores the pity.

[dromia]

What politicians say they will do and what they actually do are usually diametrically exposed.

I believe that one of the roles of good government is to protect law abiding minority interests in the country from the emotive braying of the mob calling for vengeful action. To protect the country from poor legislation and knee jerk, emotion based policy making that does absolutely nothing to address the real problem but pacifies the mob and gets a few votes.

All our political parties are guilty of this betrayal of our trust.

[Blackstuff]

Happy to stand corrected on Camoron's rifle ownership but you people are INSANE voting for Tories who WILL take your guns again ~ either at the behest of a daft, four-person "pressure" group - or, eventually, the EU.

As far as I know none of the EU countries have a handgun ban.

Indeed.

Tories. I rest my case...

If there hadn't been a general election that year the ban wouldn't have happened. The recommendations of the inquiry would've been followed and you would've had the frame at home and the slide/cylinder at your club. The only reason they went with the ban was out of desperation and thats the way the wind was blowing on the day.

A blind man on a galloping horse could see Labour were going to win the '97 election and odious Blair had already promised his first act would be to ban all handguns, therefore had the Tories not banned handguns nothing would've been gained by us and they would've done even more damage to their reputation, which is obviously more important to them than us. The very fact they exempted .22lr handguns in the face of demands by the Snowdrop campaign to ban ALL firearms tells you everything you need to know.

Don't get me wrong, the Tories (and UKIP) would 'sell us out' for votes come an election, however Labour, Greens, SNP, Liberals are all willing to introduce further firearms restrictions during their terms (as opposed to at the end/election time), without the provocation of a spree shooting.

God forgive me but the result might not have been an entirely bad thing as the splitting of parts idea could've been rolled out to all gun types!!

[meles meles]

the splitting of parts idea could've been rolled out to all gun types!!

Oh, so it's not just Remingtons we would have to avoid then ?

[James K]

Survey was pretty pointless, tells you nothing you could not have guessed anyway.

[Daniel11]

Survey was pretty pointless, tells you nothing you could not have guessed anyway.

Not entirely. It reveals that there are pro-gun Lib Dems and anti-Gun Lib Dems. Many would have assumed them to be almost entirely Anti. It also reveals that Labour has some MP's who are even more extreme than their fellow party members, for example those who propose a total ban. I also wouldn't have imagined the Alliance party in Northern Ireland to be as anti as they were. Crucially it reveals significant support across party lines but particularly in the Conservatives and UKIP for allowing .22 Pistols. This means that where previously many thought only a UKIP-Tory coalition would see any relaxation, now it seems a Tory-Lib Dem coalition could be persuaded to relax laws for example on the issue of .22 pistols.