Abolition of the 28 day rule for shooting static targets in Scotland

[Jim_DiGriz]

Do we know who it was within the Eskdalemuir community who started this ? The range has home office approval and police have used it for training ? It seems all very underhand. I’ve only heard positive reviews from folks that actually used the range and I have a friend who lives in the area who has zero connection to the range and says they’ve never heard any shooting.
Totally agree this needs nipping in the bud asap.
Thanks for posting and giving us the heads up
Ettrick reiver

The Home Office do not approve ranges.

 

[GrahamK998]

Only by your logic if an RCO piece of paper is a suitable qualification to design, construct and operate a private range which it is not when it’s specifically aimed in scope at running a military range by civilians.

Don‘t know of any such course for private ranges, in years gone by all ranges were inspected by the MOD but that all changed several years ago.

Two points:
1) I believe that it is the Range Safety Officer course that people are referring to.
&
2) The NRA freely published this which is, in effect, a copy of the design manual used by the MOD.

So, by working from an authoritative source and having taken training in how to apply it, I'm fairly sure that any court or planning body would struggle to find a more appropriate source of best practice.

 

[Selous]

Do we know who it was within the Eskdalemuir community who started this ? The range has home office approval and police have used it for training ? It seems all very underhand. I’ve only heard positive reviews from folks that actually used the range and I have a friend who lives in the area who has zero connection to the range and says they’ve never heard any shooting.
Totally agree this needs nipping in the bud asap.
Thanks for posting and giving us the heads up
Ettrick reiver

I don’t know who set this off but I did attend a public meeting in Langholm a few weeks back where Paul Adkins went to town in a very nasty manner to try to put a spoiler on the development. It was quite honestly sickening watching him try to stoke bad feeling against another section of the shooting community. I and many others including non shooters were absolutely horrified by his behaviour! Now I don’t know if he is a resident of the area but I for one won’t be having anything to do with him or Liddlesdale Wildlife Management if he seeks to restrict others access to the sport of shooting, presumably for his own gain. Not a nice man!!

 

[liddlesdale]

Wow. Can I stop you in your tracks, Paul Adkins is not part of Liddlesdale Wildlife Management, and we have nothing to do with let's hunt dinner.

The Eskdalemuir range has nothing to do with us and we are in full support of it, we can't control what a 3rd party individual sub contractor does.

Liddlesdale has never attended a meeting or sent any negative information regarding the range.

 

[beer can]

Message from Paul Adkins who is a friend of mine and not a member on here.
"False information is being spread by Gardners Guns supporters. I am not an employee of Jonathan at Liddlesdale Wildlife Management or in any way speak on behalf of that business. This spreading of deliberate lies is to deflect from the fact that the developers of the Clerkhill Range tried to cheat the planning system by constructing a major development abusing the 28 day rule while completely ignoring their responsibilities to conduct impact assessments in an area that has a unique local culture.
The local community and specifically the nearest neighbours have been fighting this development for years and understandably have been in discussions with their elected officials which given the various planning rejections and the decision of a government reporter attracted the attention of MSPs.
Yes I was at the meeting representing the community because as I have said previously to many people, I fully support the construction of new ranges but the arrogant attitudes of this developer ignoring planning law and local amenity while also ignoring a local community is the worst representation our shooting community could project being put right in the spotlight.
This whole issue is solely the doing of Gardners Guns through their building and operation of a major development without planning permission beside a community they refused to negotiate with. The people to blame for this proposal are Gardners Guns, not the community who they ignored or anyone who stood up to say what they were doing wrong. They made is easy for elected officials to mount an attack on shooting which has nothing to do with me. I just wanted them to move the range further from the village. Kind regards, Paul"

 

[Selous]

Wow. Can I stop you in your tracks, Paul Adkins is not part of Liddlesdale Wildlife Management, and we have nothing to do with let's hunt dinner.

The Eskdalemuir range has nothing to do with us and we are in full support of it, we can't control what a 3rd party individual sub contractor does.

Liddlesdale has never attended a meeting or sent any negative information regarding the range.

Sincere apologies for my inaccuracies. Paul has nothing at all to do with Liddlesdale and I was inaccurate in my understanding. Sincere apologies to Jonathan for my cock up

 

[Selous]

Message from Paul Adkins who is a friend of mine and not a member on here.
"False information is being spread by Gardners Guns supporters. I am not an employee of Jonathan at Liddlesdale Wildlife Management or in any way speak on behalf of that business. This spreading of deliberate lies is to deflect from the fact that the developers of the Clerkhill Range tried to cheat the planning system by constructing a major development abusing the 28 day rule while completely ignoring their responsibilities to conduct impact assessments in an area that has a unique local culture.
The local community and specifically the nearest neighbours have been fighting this development for years and understandably have been in discussions with their elected officials which given the various planning rejections and the decision of a government reporter attracted the attention of MSPs.
Yes I was at the meeting representing the community because as I have said previously to many people, I fully support the construction of new ranges but the arrogant attitudes of this developer ignoring planning law and local amenity while also ignoring a local community is the worst representation our shooting community could project being put right in the spotlight.
This whole issue is solely the doing of Gardners Guns through their building and operation of a major development without planning permission beside a community they refused to negotiate with. The people to blame for this proposal are Gardners Guns, not the community who they ignored or anyone who stood up to say what they were doing wrong. They made is easy for elected officials to mount an attack on shooting which has nothing to do with me. I just wanted them to move the range further from the village. Kind regards, Paul"

That is a very much toned down summary of what he might have intended to say written in a way that seems more politically acceptable to the SD audience.
In reality the man made no positive contributions to the meeting and solely made a succession of technical jibes about the work that has been done to try to get a range up and running. Like arguing the ballistics of 50 cal and .416 Barrett cartridges. Arguing that the sound testing was worthless etc etc etc It was a truly embarrassing exercise in one shooting man clearly trying to queer the pitch for many others. In the end he was asked to shut up by one of the residents and the officer from Police Scotland! There was no measure of balance in his words and no mention of him supporting a range further up the valley or that he was speaking on behalf of the community. Unfortunately he was clearly a shooting man dressed in camo who came across very badly indeed and showed that he has no morals with regard to the future of the shooting community. Be careful of the man, he is no friend to shooting.

 

[bowji john]

I’ve no dog in this race

Don’t know any of them

However I did read the nuisance noise report from an academic standpoint

I’ve conducted a few of these noise assessments myself - in a different life

The report was professional, comprehensive and compelling

No discernible noise at boundaries, nor at the locations where the noise complaints were made

 

[User00040]

That is a very much toned down summary of what he might have intended to say written in a way that seems more politically acceptable to the SD audience.
In reality the man made no positive contributions to the meeting and solely made a succession of technical jibes about the work that has been done to try to get a range up and running. Like arguing the ballistics of 50 cal and .416 Barrett cartridges. Arguing that the sound testing was worthless etc etc etc It was a truly embarrassing exercise in one shooting man clearly trying to queer the pitch for many others. In the end he was asked to shut up by one of the residents and the officer from Police Scotland! There was no measure of balance in his words and no mention of him supporting a range further up the valley or that he was speaking on behalf of the community. Unfortunately he was clearly a shooting man dressed in camo who came across very badly indeed and showed that he has no morals with regard to the future of the shooting community. Be careful of the man, he is no friend to shooting.

No surprises there...

 

[bbrc]

Is this the Paul Adkins that was on here as Paul@baroney and then paul@ecclefechan?

 

[NickJ]

Is this the Paul Adkins that was on here as Paul@baroney and then paul@ecclefechan?

Yes. Paul Adkins

 

[ContinShots]

The consultation has now closed, so I do hope as many people objected as possible. It was really important to get robust objections to this bad proposal. While it's clear the range should have applied for planning permission, it doesn't excuse trying to change an entire system across the whole of Scotland to punish one business' mistake in the Borders.

SACS have just published their response to the consultation:

Temporary Use of Land (Shooting Ranges) — Scottish Association for Country Sports

The Scottish Government sought responses to a consultation to amend planning regulations to take in target shooting ranges which are used for less than 28 days.

www.sacs.org.uk

Scottish Target Shooting has also published its response, which you can find here:

Scottish Target Shooting

There have been a couple of consultations over the last few months by the Home Office and Scottish Government that have been of relevance to the target shooting community. Both closed on 23 August 2023, with STS submitting responses to both. STS is pleased to share copies of these responses. Rea

www.scottishtargetshooting.co.uk

 

[Jim_DiGriz]

FCSA (UK) have also submitted a response.

 

[Liveonce]

A win for shooting ranges, email received today.

The consultation sought views on the principle of excluding temporary target shooting ranges from the scope of the 28-day rule. The feedback indicated that excluding temporary shooting ranges from the 28 day rule on a blanket basis could have the unintended consequence of bringing a variety of routine, small-scale works into the scope of the planning application process. It was not considered proportionate to take forward any measures, especially given that shooting is subject to separate licensing requirements – and taking account of other temporary activities that can take place under the 28 day rule or which do not constitute development (for planning purposes). Although the matter will be kept under review, it was decided not to amend the 28 day rule as regards shooting ranges at this time.


I trust this is helpful

Lyndsey Murray | Development Delivery | Planning, Architecture and Regeneration Division | Scottish Government

 

[ContinShots]

A win for shooting ranges, email received today.

The consultation sought views on the principle of excluding temporary target shooting ranges from the scope of the 28-day rule. The feedback indicated that excluding temporary shooting ranges from the 28 day rule on a blanket basis could have the unintended consequence of bringing a variety of routine, small-scale works into the scope of the planning application process. It was not considered proportionate to take forward any measures, especially given that shooting is subject to separate licensing requirements – and taking account of other temporary activities that can take place under the 28 day rule or which do not constitute development (for planning purposes). Although the matter will be kept under review, it was decided not to amend the 28 day rule as regards shooting ranges at this time.


I trust this is helpful

Lyndsey Murray | Development Delivery | Planning, Architecture and Regeneration Division | Scottish Government

Yes. A very welcome outcome. Just goes to show that it absolutely is possible to stop bad law and objecting can and does make a difference. The only thing I'd say was disappointing is that despite widespread publicity, there were still only a few hundred objections from people in the shooting community. That is pretty poor.

 

[pinkfoot1]

Great news, good to see common sense prevail.

 

[Ronin]

This is a good result for all

 

[Conor O'Gorman]

Good news and well done to all that took the time to respond to the consultation last year. BASC submitted a response to the consultation urging strongly against the introduction of new planning requirements for temporary shooting ranges.

 

[ContinShots]

Good news and well done to all that took the time to respond to the consultation last year. BASC submitted a response to the consultation urging strongly against the introduction of new planning requirements for temporary shooting ranges.

SACS put in a stonker of an objection too (Temporary Use of Land (Shooting Ranges) — Scottish Association for Country Sports). Just shows that while we might not always agree with every membership organisation on every issue, they nonetheless play an important role in advocating for shooting sports across the British Isles and need our support. I'm just delighted sense has prevailed on this occasion!

 

[finnbear270]

Great news.