REPLICA FIREARMS CONTROL BILL (Hansard, 20 March 1973)

§ Mr. John Farr (Harborough)

I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to regulate the supply and possession of replica hand and shoulder firearms. The Bill is being introduced in response to the views of a large number of hon. Members, as is possibly instanced by Early Day Motion No. 200 which appeared on the Order Paper a few weeks ago.

In an endeavour to secure a satisfactory and simple Bill which would be enacted at a fairly early date, the sponsors of the Bill and I looked at several alternatives to see which was the most appropriate. We received many suggestions. One suggestion, which we rejected out of hand, was that the possessor of any replica firearm should possess a licence for it. It was felt that that would be far too cumbersome, and the work involved ruled it out of consideration.

The second suggestion which we considered for effecting some form of sensible control was to introduce a Bill and to list in a schedule all the possible replicas which should be banned or controlled. Again it was found on research that so voluminous and numerous were the number of identical replicas available at home and abroad that such a measure would necessitate a considerable amount of work in producing a schedule, and just as much work in keeping it up to date.

Although no one has greater admiration for the ability of the Home Office and its Ministers than I, we felt this might be too much of a responsibility to place upon them, so we came to the conclusion that the best and most effective way of introducing a simple method of controlling dangerous and replica firearms was by what I will call for the purpose of this Bill the "vetting" procedure.

Briefly, this Bill when it is printed will seek to authorise the Home Secretary to establish a vetting committee which would not be large and would include, for instance, representatives from the 258 police, the Home Office, importers, manufacturers, retailers and the general public. They would meet monthly and would be concerned only with realistic hand and shoulder replica firearms. The Bill, which will be printed shortly, will define the type of replica with which the vetting committee would be concerned as one which was more than 75 per cent. physically identical with the original it was copying. The purpose of this is to free the vetting committee from a lot of cumbersome material and obvious toys which otherwise would flood in upon it.

A replica above the 75 per cent. tolerance permitted under the Bill would be submitted to the vetting committee which would be empowered to prohibit its sale in this country if it so decided. We propose to place responsibility for the submission of these replicas on the shoulders of manufacturers and importers. One of the measures we shall include in the short Bill is to provide that as soon as it is enacted by both Houses the vetting committee will be established and will come into operation at once, and the regulations concerning imported and home-manufactured replicas contained in the Bill will come into effect forthwith. It is recognised that, quite obviously, there will be considerable stocks in dealers' hands. To enable them to dispose of these it is proposed to provide a period of 18 months' grace in the Bill from the date of enactment for this purpose.

Finally, I will explain to the House that the vetting committee procedure is not at all new. It is a procedure which has been used most effectively in certain Government Departments in the past. It is currently in use in the Ministry of Agriculture in respect of agricultural chemicals and it has worked very successfully in that Department. Every new chemical, before it comes on to the market must be submitted to the Ministry's committee for vetting and approval. This procedure sometimes lasts up to three or four years. After extensive trials, chemicals which pass the test are given official approval.

It is proposed in the Bill that this vetting committee would have similar powers except that, of course, consideration and decision would be instantaneous.