Estate rifle clause

eggy s

Well-Known Member
Hi chaps,

Can some please explain to me the estate rifle clause.

We have a chap on the estate with a .22 rim fire on his ticket. Can he use one of the estate rifles without it being on his ticket unaccompanied?

Many thanks
 
Section 16 of the Firearms amendment act 1988 states that 'a rifle may be borrowed, by a person aged 17 or over, from the occupier of private premises and used on those premises in the presence of the occupier or his employee providing the latter holds the appropriate firearm certificate, but the rifle and ammunition can only be used in accordance with the conditions of that certificate.'

The person borrowing the rifle doesn't need a certificate at all but has to be 'in the presence' of the person who does (specific to the firearm being used). Interpret that how you will !
 
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A guest using an estate rifle on an accompanied stalk in under the licence and insurance of the F/A holder . Although i believe the written law is vague on the exact detail it is common sence for the F/A holder to be in a position to intervene. so arms length rather than "in earshot". In woodland stalking I walk behind the shoulder of the guest and point out routes/ game ect. On the hill i carry the rifle slipped and the guest comes up to the gun for the shot while i glass the target from immediately to his right so i can check the safety the run of the bolt ect. If the guest is competent i may be further -off left or right in order to see where the strike is and call a second shot if needed. In my experience few police officers are that aquainted with the details of gun law.
 
similar to shotgun shooting...when applying for my shotgun ticket I explained that I had joined a sindicate and i was losing days...the said head firearms officer said i can shoot on the sindicate holders license..I said I though you could only shoot on the land owners license...he replied well that is a grey area ...WHAT!! we have 'grey' firearms laws??
am i the only one that finds that amusing?
 
similar to shotgun shooting...when applying for my shotgun ticket I explained that I had joined a sindicate and i was losing days...the said head firearms officer said i can shoot on the sindicate holders license..I said I though you could only shoot on the land owners license...he replied well that is a grey area ...WHAT!! we have 'grey' firearms laws??
am i the only one that finds that amusing?

There are some differences between shotgun and firearm laws. When it comes to the question in this thread the amendment states the 'occupier' not owner of the land. It would be reasonable to interpret this as being applicable to the holder of the sporting rights or perhaps 'syndicate license holder' as much as the land owner.
 
similar to shotgun shooting...when applying for my shotgun ticket I explained that I had joined a sindicate and i was losing days...the said head firearms officer said i can shoot on the sindicate holders license..I said I though you could only shoot on the land owners license...he replied well that is a grey area ...WHAT!! we have 'grey' firearms laws??
am i the only one that finds that amusing?

This frequently comes up as I believe there is no case law to define 'the occupier' therefore it is a grey area. Most firearms lawyers or notable authorities on firearms law have offered the oppinion that a holder of the sporting rights can be taken to be the occupier.
 
This frequently comes up as I believe there is no case law to define 'the occupier' therefore it is a grey area. Most firearms lawyers or notable authorities on firearms law have offered the oppinion that a holder of the sporting rights can be taken to be the occupier.

I looked into this when I was going to mentor a friend and came up against brick walls when trying to clarify this. The police said I had to be a servant of the land owner, well my next door neighbour is a solicitor and he was laughing at that as he was wondering how to interpret that one. I then gave the police a few examples where this wasnt the case, ie when someone who has a stalking buisness takes a client out stalking who doesnt have an FAC and the above clauses wouldnt be able to be applied. Hence to say it was a bit of waffling and a lets not go there situation. Ie just because you have bought shooting rights doesnt make you a servant of the land owner.
 
I looked into this when I was going to mentor a friend and came up against brick walls when trying to clarify this. The police said I had to be a servant of the land owner, well my next door neighbour is a solicitor and he was laughing at that as he was wondering how to interpret that one. I then gave the police a few examples where this wasnt the case, ie when someone who has a stalking buisness takes a client out stalking who doesnt have an FAC and the above clauses wouldnt be able to be applied. Hence to say it was a bit of waffling and a lets not go there situation. Ie just because you have bought shooting rights doesnt make you a servant of the land owner.

This isn't surprising considering other stories of local Police authorities trying to interpret firearms law and Home Office guidelines. Bottom line is it is not your local firearms clerk who you would be answering to if you got taken to court. I prefer to look at the law myself and then the opinion of the legal experts such as Charlie Parkes and John Thornley (Their book, Deer:Law and Liabilities).
 
Last summer I went to a legal course given on behalf of the BDS by this redoutable duo.

I asked the following question: If I put a guest without a FAC on a high seat and I rig up a video link as well as a walkie talkie so that I can see and hear all his movements. (I myself am 500 yards away). Am I within the law? The answer was clear: NO.

I asked exactly the same question to a High Court judge later in the year. The answer was clear: YES

No wonder Solicitors and barristers are doing well!
 
Last summer I went to a legal course given on behalf of the BDS by this redoutable duo.

I asked the following question: If I put a guest without a FAC on a high seat and I rig up a video link as well as a walkie talkie so that I can see and hear all his movements. (I myself am 500 yards away). Am I within the law? The answer was clear: NO.

I asked exactly the same question to a High Court judge later in the year. The answer was clear: YES

No wonder Solicitors and barristers are doing well!


I would still go with Parkes and Thornley! There is the aspect to consider of being able to intervene should anything go wrong. I would have thought another Judge might answer no and I wonder which one you would end up with if you ever went to court?
 
I would still go with Parkes and Thornley! There is the aspect to consider of being able to intervene should anything go wrong. I would have thought another Judge might answer no and I wonder which one you would end up with if you ever went to court?

I think it comes down to two things when considering this.

Firstly what experiance does the borrower of the rifle have with firearms and would an ordinary person in the street consider it reasonable known in legal terms as wednesbury reasonableness.

Consider two situations.

In both situations the guide lends guest rifle and leaves him in a highseat 100m away from the guides highseat. So within sight and earshot.


In the first situation the guest has been out with the guide many times has DSC 1 and has experiance with firearms he did hold an FAC but as he is in the Army and is currently posted to Germany so does not have a UK address therefore cannot hold an FAC.

Situation two the guest has never stalked before and the first time the guide met the guest 10 minutes before they sat out. The guest has stalked once before but does not have any guns and no other firearms experiance.

Which one would an average person think reasonable?

Is it really worth gambling your FAC?

Don't forget you are responsible for the security of your Firearms if you are not in a position to intervene how can you be complying with the security conditions of your certificate.
 
I would still go with Parkes and Thornley! There is the aspect to consider of being able to intervene should anything go wrong. I would have thought another Judge might answer no and I wonder which one you would end up with if you ever went to court?

If I ended up in court I would make pretty certain that the judge knew what his fellow judge had told me!

That said I have no intention of rigging up videos and suchlike on my highseats. The matter was purely theoretical.
 
I think it comes down to two things when considering this.

Firstly what experiance does the borrower of the rifle have with firearms and would an ordinary person in the street consider it reasonable known in legal terms as wednesbury reasonableness.

Consider two situations.

In both situations the guide lends guest rifle and leaves him in a highseat 100m away from the guides highseat. So within sight and earshot.


In the first situation the guest has been out with the guide many times has DSC 1 and has experiance with firearms he did hold an FAC but as he is in the Army and is currently posted to Germany so does not have a UK address therefore cannot hold an FAC.

Situation two the guest has never stalked before and the first time the guide met the guest 10 minutes before they sat out. The guest has stalked once before but does not have any guns and no other firearms experiance.

Which one would an average person think reasonable?

Is it really worth gambling your FAC?

Don't forget you are responsible for the security of your Firearms if you are not in a position to intervene how can you be complying with the security conditions of your certificate.

I'm not sure that Wednesbury reasonableness has anything at all to so with this: but perhaps I have misunderstood the application of Wednesbury reasonableness, which I hitherto thought was used as the yardstick for restrictions applied by authorities to others (like FAC conditions, for example), rather than as a way to appraise the sensibleness or otherwise of a subject's behaviour with respect to statute law.
Perhaps you are thinking of 'the man on the Clapham omnibus'?

It seems to me that the security condition of the FAC is not relevant if a chap is lawfully using your rifle under this provision, as he is lawfully in possession of it.

I'd agree that it seems sensible to behave differently with blokes of different levels of experience, but I'd imagine that having granted the borrower a degree of autonomy appropriate to his experience and ability, then the borrower would be responsible, as a capacitous adult, for his own actions with the rifle.
 
Wednesbury reasonableness is English case law from the case of Associated Provincial Picture Houses v Wednesbury Corporation
 
Wednesbury reasonableness is English case law from the case of Associated Provincial Picture Houses v Wednesbury Corporation

I know that, but does that mean it applies equally to every occasion where you might imagine a test of 'reasonableness' is appropriate? That's what I'm less certain about, you see? The 'the man on the Clapham omnibus' test really only applies to civil negligence cases.

It is complex, isn't it!
:)
 
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