There has been an understandably concerned reaction to a Euro wide consultation on the subject of restricting gun ownership. Whilst the UK’s shooting organisations have no problem with discussing the matter they have reacted angrily to the tenor of the accompanying questionnaire. The British Association for Shooting and Conservation (BASC) described it as “one of most biased” it had ever seen. The British Shooting Sports Council (BSSC) was in no doubt either about the purpose of the questionnaire saying it was designed to give the process some “appearance of legitimacy with the aim of introducing further restrictions on the use of firearms”.
Whilst there is no reason for complacency – consultations like this have a nasty habit of suddenly becoming enshrined in law – any resulting restrictions likely to impact upon shooting sports will first have to overcome the powerful French and Italian shooting lobbies and that isn’t likely to happen any time soon. Click here to see the questionnaire.