Insurance

legaleagle69

Well-Known Member
We have all complained often enough about having to join BASC or some other association just to get insurance.
I dropped across this on the internet when mooching around myself to try for the best deal.

http://www.guninsurance.co.uk/shooting-hunting-club.cfm

If I am correct it will enable a group to get there own insurance and circumvent the need for the leeches :lol:

Anyone interested if so I would be happy to call these guys and look around for other providers to get the best deal..
 
Hi,

One of the ‘leeches’ here!

Yep cheap deals are out there as I have said many times before .But remember that shoot accidents are very rare- BASC insures around 127,000 shooters, and we see less than 100 claims a year. So chances are that when paying your insurance premium only to an insurance company you are getting cover, you will probably never make a claim in your life- so what else are you getting for your money?

Insurance companies are there to make a profit for the insurance company and their share holders. The shooting organisations all, to my knowledge, operate on a not for profit basis so all their income goes back into achieving their objectives and servicing their members – their shareholders.

Remember that all the organisations offer more than just insurance.

To go shooting you need:

• Somewhere to shoot
• Something to shot at
• Something to shoot with

An insurance company cannot deliver that – I would argue that the shooting organisations do – so who should you support? An insurance company or a shooting organisation? I know where my £ is going!

Best wishes

David
 
Well said 300WSM, clever words and well used phrases cannot disguise the amount of members money that is not being put to best use. It is the small things that really annoy me, first class rail travel, and disparate mobile phones were I believe two that have been mentioned recently. If I have got that right then I believe that we have a legitimate reason to complain.

John
 
David BASC said:
To go shooting you need:

• Somewhere to shoot
• Something to shot at
• Something to shoot with

An insurance company cannot deliver that – I would argue that the shooting organisations do – so who should you support? An insurance company or a shooting organisation? I know where my £ is going!

Excellent - an offer of something positive at last. As I'm a member of BASC, I'll look forward to being provided with a nice bit roe stalking in the Hampshire/Wiltshire area in return for my subs ...... thought not.

So guess why I'm a member? No prizes.
 
I understand that the BASC does do some sterling work, however it really is not run by the members for the members, the reason why, simple most of us wil not get of our arses and vote these "leeches" out of office.
I was a member for many years didn't need them.
Following a breakdown of my relationship the police unreasonably seized my guns, the BASC said I should maybe take up fishing for a while..
Luckily I was also a member of The Shooters Rights Association, a great bloke called Richard Law fought the police tooth and nail and got my certificate re-instated
So I had something to shoot with David :lol:
I also seem to remember it was the countryside alliance that has made some of the biggest impacts so far on public awareness, or were the shareholders having a little bubbly at the time.. got to have a little bubbly have the shareholders eh
 
Not sure where you get the idea that we go round spending members money on posh lunches-, first class rail travel chapagne etcetc. This is simply an emotive accusation that cannot be proven of course, but one that as you see has evoked the sort of response you were after I am sure. I will not be drawn again on unsubstantiated accusation. Making accusations like that does nothing for the debate in my opinion, so can we agree to stop this?

BASC’s objectives are (we hope) clear- all our work aims to make sure that we have:

A strong and unified voice for shooting
All-party backing for shooting
Balanced comment in the media
Continuing opportunity to go shooting
High standards

How do we do this?

Political lobbying plays a major roll with the first two.

Developing positive and strong relationships with the media take care of no 3

More lobbying, for no 4, together with the efforts we put into develop the stalking schemes, wildfowling permit schemes and the ‘Go Shooting’ project where we offer free adverts to members to promote their shooting opportunities.

For the final point this relies heavily on training courses and codes of practice for example.

Over and above this of course our teams here are on call to support members with advice and guidance – for example:

Gamekeeping
Game shooting
Stalking
Wildfowling
Firearms issues
Shoot management
Shoot improvement
Health & Safety
Shooting leases

And BASC is run by the members- the members vote for members to be elected to the ruling Council for goodnes sake!

Clever words- well how else can I respond!

Ok ready to get shot down in flames for trying to answer the points you ask.

Best wishes

David
 
Thank you for your honesty.

I agree with you in so far as part of the measure is what happens when you call for help- but the other part of the measure is how effective the organisation is at achieving it's objectives.

BASC cannot exist without members - we all know that

If you feel we have let you down I am sorry.

If you want me to look into the two cases where you feel we let you down please send me the details and I will gladly look into this for you. PM me or e-mail me directly if you wish.,

Thanks again.

David
 
I did not make emotive accusations that cannot be proven, I did say these things in order to get a response, but the response I was after was from you assuring me that our money is not misspent. You have only said these accusations cannot be proven, you have made no attempt to disprove them. I was pretty sure I read on this forum about the train and mobile phone thing, in fact I thought it was Griff that mentioned it in one of his earlier posts. He, if it was him, was highlighting his surprise at the use of differing phone networks by the Council, and the use of first class rail travel, are you telling me, us, this is not the case?

"Making accusations like that does nothing for the debate in my opinion, so can we agree to stop this?" No we can't agree, I can't agree, if you don't like it we don't talk about? I don't think so. Just answer these two points for me and I will shut up about it, nothing technical over policy or anything like that, simple stuff.

The mobile phones used by the ruling Council, and paid for by BASC, are they on different networks with different price plans or or they on a negotiated one network rate?

First class rail travel, is this a fact or not. Is it an option for the Council and if it is, is it an option that is taken up?

Simple questions that require simple answers, not the party line in the form of a political broadcast.

You rightly point out that it is the members that elect members to the ruling council but as was pointed out earlier, BASC has 127,000 members and only 3% of them voted, it sounds as if apathy played a great part in electing our Council.

I am not denying the fact that there needs to be a lot of politicking to make the whole show run smoothly, that it needs a substantial support system to sustain it and that these things come at a price, however I also need to know that my, our, money is not being wasted.

How else can I respond?

John
 
Thanks John,

Sorry if I missed the point you were trying to make and thank you for clarifying it for me.

As Council members are not members of staff we cannot stipulate what mobile network they use- staff however are on a single system / supplier so we can save money on phone bills.

We will always encourage council members and staff that travel to do so by the most cost effective basis- take train journeys for example- travel outside of peak times and book long in advance. I do not know of any council member that has travelled here by first class rail and would be very surprised and concerned (as a member) if they did. Like you I want my membership spent of safeguarding my sport and giving me a service and not spent on posh lunches and posh travel!.

We always remember that the money the members send in via subscription is there to a: deliver a service and b; to deliver on our stated objectives- so wasting money needlessly on posh travel etc is not on!
 
Well to a bloke from an ordidary background the "do's" in the BASC mag seemed quite posh to me.. :rolleyes:

Mind you I suppose you cannot lobby the other fat cats with pie and peas.. except Mr Prescott would have been an exception :lol:

I know I had nothing in common with the guys I have ever met at the game fairs, no one came over to me said yup lad hows thee whipet?

More often than not it was some plummy mouthed toff with a pair of purdeys to use as seconds when the Boss is in the shop :D looking down at me wondering why he had to speak to an oik like me unlike his mates working in the city :lol:

I am curious what exactly did you do when semi auto's were banned and pistols?
 
Oh then there was the hunting with dogs, forgot that one.. sorry
I suppose the list is endless but those three main encroachments on our freedom of indivual choice and expression seem to be where you when you should have been staging major rallies and protests

It's a shame we don't have a real NRA like the yanks :evil:
 
Ta for that lad!

The ‘posh do’ you refer to was the ad for our Centenary Ball – surely you can forgive us a posh fund raising do now and again?

Semi auto’s before my time to be honest- only been here for 13 years but full bore semi autos not used much in live quarry shooting- not trying to avoid the issue just trying to make the point that this was probably more in the domain of the NRA as they were mainly used for target shooting than BASC, where our main remit is live quarry shooting.

Pistols- I was here for that one. I remember the BBC camping outside Marford Mill at lunchtime on the day of the killing. I remember BASC being the only organisation to give live TV interviews on the day to try and defend pistol shooting, as unfortunately the National Pistol Association were not answering the phone. I remember BASC being the first organisation to get a member of staff on live TV the following morning again to defend pistol shooting, I remember BASC diverting practically all of its political resources to this campaign. I remember BASC successfully campaigning to keep .22 target pistols (overturned by the new Labour Government) OK we lost- but at least we fought!

That was a tough one I admit, and can think of nothing that could have been done politically that would have made any difference. Unfortunately we do not have the same culture as the USA (or perhaps it is fortunate we do not?) so an aggressive American NRA would not hold water IMHO. I know others do not agree but that is my opinion.

BASC have also keenly defended people’s right to keep a pistol for humane dispatch, and have fought several cases (successfully) for stalkers.

Hunting with Hounds- not sporting shooting, and so not our area of knowledge. We actively supported the CA through the rally, marches and so on , but agreed with them very early on that as this was their area of expertise they would take the lead and ask us for support when they thought it was most relevant, this they did and we did.

David
 
David,
I have been a member of BASC for a long time, six digit membership No, and the only time I called upon BASC to help me was when I was a serving Police Officer, like you, and I was being mucked about with a shotgun renewal.
I knew the law and knew the answer but being in the job it could have marked me as a trouble maker so decided to let BASC deal with it as it could have affected all the SGC holders in Wiltshire.
I contacted John Dryden, who was more concerned with how I got his direct telephone No than my problem.
It was given to me by a member of his staff, having told her of the problem and she thought it of sufficient urgency to speak to him direct.
However when he finally calmed down and listened, he told me exactly what I knew already about the law and told me to go back and tell them, refuse to comply and stamp my foot if necessary, if that didn't work come back then.
That was exactly what I didn't want to do and was hoping BASC would have done it for me and all the other SGC holders.
The 'problem' was when Wiltshire decided that to renew or apply for a SGC you had to submit written authority and location of Farms where vermin/pottering or walked up Game shooting was to take place!
It died a death eventually but I bet a lot of people were put to a lot of unnecessary trouble for a while.
So there you have it, the only time and let down big time.
 
I think you are being a bit unfair lads,
I agree the cost of membership is high, as it the cost of most things these days it only works out at a quid or so per week, hell I must loose that down the back of the sofa most weeks. :lol:


So the Basc council are toffs? so what? at least they can talk to the other toffs that run the bloody country.

I often talk to the people behind the stalls at gamefairs, most of them are volunteers helping out and if you take the chance to talk to them you would find this out.
 
I joined The Badger And Swan Club when it was still WAGBI. Gave up my member ship when i moved to sweden. Must say that many of the points bought up about the BASC are the same that i heard from my shooting friends 5 years ago. So things have not changed much in that time. I agree with many of the criticisms that have been aired on this forum.
If other members of the Basc management are like Mr Dryden, who i have had dealings with at a Basc triple challenge then there is no hope for the BASC.

To there great shame it was the BDS who helped sell out semi auto rifle users.
 
John is no longer wth BASC.

Our Head Office firearms team deal with all the FLO's - some are good, some not so good. It is fair to say that we have managed to work along side most, and just about every day, because of our relationship with the FLO's we are able to sort our members problems.

As I have said, somtimes we get it wrong, somtimes our face to face reaction is not what it should be - but we will always try to get better and better.

David
 
Bob the reason the "toffs" are running the country is the same reason that only 3% of the members voted people are lazy and apathetic these days and only complain when it affects them personally.

If we all took amore active role then we could have a great country once again, but to be frank I doubt this will ever happen and things are just going to get worse..

I feel that an US modelled NRA is exactly what is needed to aggresively make the point.

I would like to say I do recall the guys from Marford Mill being on TV, however I seem to remember that we all held back out of sympathy, yes I am sorry the tragedy happened but it should have been pointed out more forcefully the absolute blame Allegedly lay with a corrupt officer who pushed through the application of a fellow peadophile then blew his brains out with an illegally held pistol when it all came on top .. these are the people we allow to govern us .. :rolleyes: oh god we are all doomed .. :lol:
 
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