Changes to Firearms Licensing. What would you do?

[gixer1]

A few years ago I bought some gunslips and other bits and pieces from a woman whose partner alledgely made threats to assault her while under the influence of drink, she had to call the Police , the partner left the property before the Police arrived and she said she had the knock on the door at 4-30 am several fire arms officers with vans and cleared all the firearms and items associated with them and he had his certificates revoked for good so she just sold off what was left.

Wonder how they accessed the guns if the guy was out…

 

[MarkD123]

Wonder how they accessed the guns if the guy was out…

Was just thinking exactly the same thing.

 

[kes]

The OP was a straightforward question - what would I change -The licensing body first.
The Police are not suited to this task, it needs very specific statutory guidance which we would meet. All previous fatalities by legally held gun owners result from some form of Licensing or Licensing Authority failure.
Variations in approaches confuses and does not inspire confidence - medicals have been changed and are supposedly live and the process did not detect this problem yet we are all now required to do this at our own expense.
Anyone who has 'issues' needs to be confident that treatment is fair but public safety (fairly determined within the licensing laws) should be the overriding concern. A few bullets over the limit is not a real problem and should not result in a mandatory loss of licence, for example.
However, any specific incident which leads to concerns which may affect retention of a licence should be the subject of a licensing review body. In the public good, witness and medical statements could be considered as though a potential criminal act might result. Bird and others would have been caught and refused return of firearms until much later, if at all. Their must be a system where challenging the decision to withdraw certs must be demonstrably based on the facts of the case and not be by who has the most money for lawyers.
I believe we, as cert holders, exercise a right, not a privilege but I would favour 'considered' doubt resulting in withdrawl of certificates for a period - but not at the gift of the Police who have demonstrated a previous poor record and personal attitudes to Guidance.

Therefore, Statutory Guidance, a new licensing Authority, a sound and reasonable review process and absolute adherence to rules would provide all shooters and public with the confidence needed for those who own and are licensed to carry guns to believe individual CCons are not pursuing personal agendas..
It is not a crime to own a gun under licence, if the system were properly controlled the fear of guns could well disappear.

I would also make lightweight journalism a crime where public fear is unnecessarily fomented. The punishment would be unemployment not celebrity status.

Our shooting orgs are no doubt discussing this as we speak - I wont hold my breath.

 

[JTO]

Having admitted to having mental health problems, will Prince Harry be allowed a gun license if he returns to the UK?

 

[Ladygun]

First let me state that before retiring a few years back I was a Community Psychiatric Nurse so I do have a little professional knowledge of mental health issues. Whenever some tabloid hack mentions mental health I groan! The press seems to think mental health is like a broken leg; you either have it or you don't. You are either totally sane or a potential psychopathic killer with a blood lust. The other problem is that, in my experience, most GPs have only a basic understanding of mental health problems so are not necessarily the best people to make decisions re firearms. A face to face apointment with a GP is typically 10 minutes and although its enough do decide if the patient has a depressive illness, or other relevant condition, its not anything like enough time to uderstand the context and background to the problem and to assess the degree of risk the person may pose to himself or the wider public, if indeed that particular MH problem poses any risk at all. Secondly, how recently has the GP seen the patient for whom he is writing the police report? I live a part of the UK that requires a medical report in order to get an FAC or SGC. My own GP kindly wrote a report for me without having ever met me! Its seems that the medical report system is in most cases little more than a box ticking exercise. Yes it may highlight a serious current problem but often MH problems vary over time. Someone who was suffering from a mild depressive episode when he last saw the GP 6 months ago could today be over the problem but likewise could have deteriorated without them contacting medical services. But even that does not necessarily equate with an increased risk to himself or the public. I would agree that there is certainly a need for some sort of medical input before the granting of SGCs or FACs but the current system is not only patchy and not fair on GPs but it not fit for purpose.

At the moment GPs are required only to confirm that the applicant does not have relevant medical conditions as defined by the Home Office guidance, or otherwise, which in turn the applicant has to declare on their application. They do not need to see the patient at all, just look at their records. If there is a relevant medical condition, the GP should say what it was and when it was, they do not have to give any detail about the impact on firearms ownership, that is for the police to decide.
As a professor of psychiatry, on publicly available information at the moment, this looks like a fairly typical family annihilation/autogenic massacre scenario, in the context of serious personality dysfunction, which would have been a longstanding issue, culminating in sudden complete decompensation and loss of control. It may not be possible to identify the final trigger(s) but it’s usually some sort of personal reversal. It’s rather disturbing to me that someone considered an anger management intervention would manage the risk in an allegedly assaultative young man who had a firearm like this one, but then again, FEOs do not have mandatory training in mental health, and mental health professionals rarely know anything about firearms. I occasionally teach to both audiences, but have encountered resistance from the NHS: the Royal College of Psychiatrists and the General Medical Council have zero to say about firearms, despite that ownership is not uncommon. To get back to Plymouth, Pete1774 is absolutely right that risks fluctuate, mercifully to this extent vanishing rarely. The risk of suicide by firearm is orders of magnitude greater than homicide, in fact homicide with a legally held firearm is so rare that the Home Office do not collect the figures.

 

[long_range_rob]

Personally I’d stop speculating until the facts are in (assuming they’re not hushed up as usual) I’d show consideration and empathy for those directly affected and I’d stop trying to destroy my sport on an open Internet forum. But that’s just me

 

[Cloudhopper]

At the moment GPs are required only to confirm that the applicant does not have relevant medical conditions as defined by the Home Office guidance, or otherwise, which in turn the applicant has to declare on their application. They do not need to see the patient at all, just look at their records. If there is a relevant medical condition, the GP should say what it was and when it was, they do not have to give any detail about the impact on firearms ownership, that is for the police to decide.
As a professor of psychiatry, on publicly available information at the moment, this looks like a fairly typical family annihilation/autogenic massacre scenario, in the context of serious personality dysfunction, which would have been a longstanding issue, culminating in sudden complete decompensation and loss of control. It may not be possible to identify the final trigger(s) but it’s usually some sort of personal reversal. It’s rather disturbing to me that someone considered an anger management intervention would manage the risk in an allegedly assaultative young man who had a firearm like this one, but then again, FEOs do not have mandatory training in mental health, and mental health professionals rarely know anything about firearms. I occasionally teach to both audiences, but have encountered resistance from the NHS: the Royal College of Psychiatrists and the General Medical Council have zero to say about firearms, despite that ownership is not uncommon. To get back to Plymouth, Pete1774 is absolutely right that risks fluctuate, mercifully to this extent vanishing rarely. The risk of suicide by firearm is orders of magnitude greater than homicide, in fact homicide with a legally held firearm is so rare that the Home Office do not collect the figures.

If this individual had been assessed by someone such as yourself before he had his shotgun returned are you confident that his issues would have been detected and the tragedy avoided?
CH

 

[Heym SR20]

There is no need to change anything in terms of Firearms Licencing in terms of law and legislation.

What does need changing is some of those within the Police that are administering it. Why the **** is a 22 year old with clear anger management issues who has had his certificate re-voked, given his certificate and guns back? That is the question that needs answering.

But I suspect we will get a massive knee jerk reaction with major coverups, locked records for 100 years etc etc.

 

[Ladygun]

If this individual had been assessed by someone such as yourself before he had his shotgun returned are you confident that his issues would have been detected and the tragedy avoided?
CH

It would be presumptuous and wrong to say that. Even so, an in depth evaluation by an experienced psychiatrist with the benefit of his full mental heath history and an account from an informant and his FEO could have raised alarm bells. I haven’t seen his social media posts, but it they are as described then you would not need to be a mental health expert to have concerns, certainly. It’s not clear if that information was or should have been available to whoever made the decision to return then gun. The best decisions are made in the presence of the totality of relevant information, preferably ‘joined up’ between the interested parties whenever possible. It may include a GP, a mental health professional, a close relative, as well as the FEO and their manager, working together for the safest outcome. Those of us who are used to firearms tend to forget how afraid everyone else is of them, which doesn’t help. I complete several reports a year for applicants in difficulty, utilising this approach, and it usually works out OK. I can’t say any more than that, and apologise if I have not been able to answer your question as you hoped, but thank you for asking it.

 

[mealiejimmy]

Thank you for your posts.
It's excellent to have input from someone who is a mental health professional and a shooter - would that there were more like you.

Cheers

Bruce

 

[User00035]

The OP was a straightforward question - what would I change -The licensing body first.
The Police are not suited to this task, it needs very specific statutory guidance which we would meet. All previous fatalities by legally held gun owners result from some form of Licensing or Licensing Authority failure.
Variations in approaches confuses and does not inspire confidence - medicals have been changed and are supposedly live and the process did not detect this problem yet we are all now required to do this at our own expense.
Anyone who has 'issues' needs to be confident that treatment is fair but public safety (fairly determined within the licensing laws) should be the overriding concern. A few bullets over the limit is not a real problem and should not result in a mandatory loss of licence, for example.
However, any specific incident which leads to concerns which may affect retention of a licence should be the subject of a licensing review body. In the public good, witness and medical statements could be considered as though a potential criminal act might result. Bird and others would have been caught and refused return of firearms until much later, if at all. Their must be a system where challenging the decision to withdraw certs must be demonstrably based on the facts of the case and not be by who has the most money for lawyers.
I believe we, as cert holders, exercise a right, not a privilege but I would favour 'considered' doubt resulting in withdrawl of certificates for a period - but not at the gift of the Police who have demonstrated a previous poor record and personal attitudes to Guidance.

Therefore, Statutory Guidance, a new licensing Authority, a sound and reasonable review process and absolute adherence to rules would provide all shooters and public with the confidence needed for those who own and are licensed to carry guns to believe individual CCons are not pursuing personal agendas..
It is not a crime to own a gun under licence, if the system were properly controlled the fear of guns could well disappear.

I would also make lightweight journalism a crime where public fear is unnecessarily fomented. The punishment would be unemployment not celebrity status.

Our shooting orgs are no doubt discussing this as we speak - I wont hold my breath.

Yep. This

 

[Fadcode]

If you go back a few years, and look at the changes in the law regarding knives, you may just get some idea of what they can do.
The way to look at this , is to forget you have any interest in firearms, and ask yourself what would you want the Govt to do to avoid things like this happening again, it isn't any use blaming the Police for returning his guns, or not knowing about his mental health issues, etc .........because until we get the full picture of what went on, we don't know who is to blame, or what was actually known about the shooter..
It is the effect on the public at large the Govt and Police will be interested in, they won't be worried about the effect on licence holders, as they are out numbered by the public, the first duty of any Govt is the safety and welfare of it's citizens, and they will take all the measures they need to fulfil that aim, regardless of the effect on the shooting fraternity.

One of the things that will come out is what was on social media about this guy, and knowing what they can find out, be careful what you post.

It's always the majority that suffers for the actions of the minorities,

 

[finnbear270]

Wonder how they accessed the guns if the guy was out…

I have seen them training in several entry methods.

 

[willie_gunn]

But how would the police monitor social media posts if a user has a pseudonym? Most of us on here are anonymous aren’t we. I don’t know how the police would be able to see anyone making unsuitable comments and know who it was.

Perhaps the applicant might be compelled to disclose all their social media accounts, with failure to do so being a valid reason for refusal/revocation of a grant?

In the paper this morning I read comments from the D&C police Chief Constable that they did not trawl through the perpetrators social media accounts because of privacy concerns. In the same report Lord Stevens, the former Met
police commissioner, recommends that this should be part of the process in the future. I doubt privacy concerns will hold much water when it comes to the opinions MP’s and the general public on firearms licensing.

We already agree to full disclosure of our medical records, so the inevitable question will be “why should our social media accounts be any different?”

 

[Stalker62]

We already agree to full disclosure of our medical records, so the inevitable question will be “why should our social media accounts be any different?”

Well some of the posts on SD will make for "interesting" observation by any vetting team...

 

[User00026]

He would likely have used another tool such as knife or car to conduct the crimes in lack of a firearm, the outcome could possibly have been worse or more gruesome. It’s not the fact he had a SGC that made him commit these crimes.

you cannot ‘thought police’, nor ask people to undergo psychological evaluations, it’s not only non-feasible but also too open to bias or error, etc, etc. Therefore my guess is that IF any changes come down the line from this event, it will be that once a revocation has taken place, it cannot be appealed against and reissued, unless legally/court proven to have been done in a course of gross injustice.

 

[willie_gunn]

Well some of the posts on SD will make for "interesting" observation by any vetting team...

Indeed, and all they’d have to do to make a start is review the Closed threads.

 

[User00026]

Indeed, and all they’d have to do to make a start is review the Closed threads.

Let’s not give them any ideas sometimes we are our own worst enemies , keeping spent cases and primers as proof of ammo used for example…

 

[willie_gunn]

Let’s not give them any ideas sometimes we are our own worst enemies , keeping spent cases and primers as proof of ammo used for example…

I imagine there are a few members here regretting the lack of a “Delete Post” option.

Who knows, perhaps it might make them pause for a moment’s reflection before hitting the “Post reply” button in the future and - even better - consider why their views might well be construed as offensive?

 

[kamyonsofor]

Wonder how they accessed the guns if the guy was out…

Big no no she had the access to the keys .