Air Weapons (Hansard, 19 July 1984)

§ 6. Mr. Chapman
asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will report progress on initiatives to discourage the misuse of air weapons.

§ The Minister of State, Home Office (Mr. David Waddington)
Consideration of any further initiatives must wait until we have a clearer indication of the success of the recent campaign. In the meantime, all the publicity material produced for the campaign, including the leaflet and television filler films, will continue to be available. Other local initiatives are a matter for chief officers of police.

§ Mr. Chapman
I thank my hon. and learned Friend for that information. Bearing in mind the strong evidence that the number of cases of the misuse of air weapons escalates during school holiday times, will he give sympathetic consideration to an immediate national media campaign to warn parents of their responsibilities in respect of the use by their children of these weapons?

§ Mr. Waddington
My hon. Friend does the country a service by keeping the matter of the misuse of air weapons in the public eye. We have not yet had the statistics of offences involving the misuse of air weapons since the time of the publicity campaign. It is probably better to wait until they are evaluated before deciding on what should be the next step.

§ Mr. Eastham
It is estimated that there are 4 million airguns, shotguns, rifles and pistols in circulation in Britain today. Is it not about time that we took more positive action to deal with the matter? Is the hon. And 498 learned Gentleman aware that it is estimated that the damage from airguns alone is costing the country between £3 million and £4 million a year?

§ Mr. Waddington
The hon. Gentleman knows well that there are laws controlling the use of weapons of all sorts. Indeed, the number of laws is legion. The question is whether to produce new laws and thereby involve the police in the expenditure of more time on the enforcement of those new laws would be the best use of police resources.

§ Sir John Farr
Is my hon. and learned Friend about to prepare an analysis of the results of the last Home Office campaign? Will he put the results in the Library? Will he turn his mind to the question of whether enough money was spent on the campaign, which was run on a limited budget?

§ Mr. Waddington
I do not think that my hon. Friend would expect me to give a full answer to that quesion now. I have said already that the next step must be to look at the statistics on offences involving firearms since the time of the campaign. We can then decide where we shall go next.

§ Mr. Wrigglesworth
In view of the overwhelming evidence that the abuses and damage caused by these guns take place among young people, does not the hon. and learned Gentleman think that the time has come, despite the publicity campaign, to change the law to restrict the access of young people to those guns and to make it clear to the country that the guns are not overgrown toys but dangerous weapons?

§ Mr. Waddington
The hon. Gentleman is right to make that last point. One must not lose sight of the fact that there are already considerable restrictions on the purchase and hire of such weapons—for instance, they cannot be purchased or hired by people between the ages of 14 and 17. I must repeat the point that I originally made and emphasise that, happily, in 1981 and 1982 there was a fall in the number of crimes involving the use of air weapons.

§ Mr. Stuart Holland
The Minister must be aware that it is considerably easier to purchase shotguns than other kinds of firearms. The hon. and learned Gentleman has referred to imposing more difficulties on the police. Is he aware that, for example, the Lambeth police community liaison committee has made representations to him about the issue of shotguns? Will he respond to those representations?

§ Mr. Waddington
When one is considering imposing more controls on shotguns, one must remember that a determined criminal will try to evade any level of control. That is clear from the fact that hand guns are used frequently in the commission of crime, although there are very stringent controls on their possession and use.