Another unhelpful headline from the Independent

[dromia]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/cr ... 54533.html

Article mainly talks about the work of National Ballistics Intelligence Service but they pull out this for the headline: Still lethal aged 100: UK gangs load up on antique guns - with no registration required

Scumbag journalists!

[Dougan]

It's a totally ridiculous headline - Apart from the massive exaggeration by using the term 'loading up'...like their stockpiling them :roll: ...

...what do they mean by 'no registration required'?! - Whatever handgun a crim gets his hands on is an illegal firearm, whether it's 1 year old or 100 years old!

[Gaz]

There's nothing in the article to suggest "loading up", but as for "no registration required", do dealers need to record sales of section 58s like they do normal firearms? If so the Indy's made a factual error, and those tend to get corrected. (sadly too late to catch the last print edition for tomorrow, unless someone fancies ringing the night editor and arguing the point convincingly in the minutes left before it goes on press)

Incidentally, if I was the makers of American Eagle, Fiocchi or Magtech ammo, I'd be calling my lawyers over the use of a photograph clearly making a link between my products and criminals.

[Sim G]

No requirement for any details of the transaction in S58 to be recorded. They can even be posted direct to your door.....

[dave_303]

The Indpendant did forget to mention one thing, yes you can legally OWN these guns without a certificate, they ignore the fact that shooting one and possessing ammunition requires a certificate.

[Tower75]

Okay, Independant. 'Cos hood gangs know about firearms as a whole; I'd to see them get hold of some the S58 calibre cartridges.

Must be a huge problem. The amount of people being killed with 11m Veterli rimfire rifles... oh, wait.

They then go on to say:

the fight against gun crime which has seen the number of offences involving firearms fall in England and Wales from 24,000 in 2003 to 9,555 last year.

What a non-article.

[Gaz]

I have a feeling this is a freelance journo who's managed to get "access" to a couple of mid-ranking NABIS bods keen to play up how wonderful the police approach to firearms is. He'll have no knowledge of the topic and has uncritically repeated their claims, stats and so on "because authority, innit".

Happens a lot, unfortunately.

Thanks Sim. In which case their headline is factual - section 58s are lawful firearms that do not require "registration" via an FAC/SGC as section 1 and 2 firearms do. "Load up" seems to work as well, based on the flimsy claim in the first par that police are seeing more S58s on the street.

I'm thinking, based on previous murmurings, that ACPO are laying the ground to argue that Section 58 needs to be revoked.

[Gaz]

... and, ten minutes later, look what else has popped up:

EU's Malmstroem pushes for tougher, unified European gun laws

Home Affairs Commissioner Cecilia Malmstroem has said the EU can "no longer watch on without acting" as 1,000 Europeans are killed in gun violence each year. She is proposing unified, stricter rules for the whole bloc.

http://www.dw.de/eus-malmstroem-pushes- ... a-17170795

In brief, she wants tougher restrictions on antique firearms, as well as a ban on internet sales (yup) and some vague threats about "revising which guns are eligible for home ownership".

[Tower75]

Wow, so the amount of people who are killed each year in Europe by firearms is less than the amount of people who die each year in the U.K. from alcohol?

Yes, yes, this is terrible, we must act now.

[Sim G]

This is the start. A statement here, a newspaper article there. In the absence of a mass shooting horror, drip feed the populace till they view it as acceptable.

Case in point, how many people think that ID cards are a good idea? Drip feeding started 20 years ago to a barrage of condemnation when a government policy document was discovered in a disposed of home office filing cabinet, in a second hand furniture shop...