Just how safe do you think our legal defence is?

[Ironhide]

Re: Just how safe do you think our legal defence is?

Theresa May, home sec, there defence, they can take it away.

simples

[bravotwozero]

Re: Just how safe do you think our legal defence is?

End of the day it's parliament and it's members, or more realistically, civil servants who have the final say.

I doubt they wouldn't even consult parliament, the way things are now i'd imagine the act would just be quietly changed by an individual if our defence was to be taken away.

Judges or the courts can only interpret (or bend) it slightly.

Police? since when do they have legislative powers?

[Fluxeor]

Re: Just how safe do you think our legal defence is?

Well, the Police and Court systems don't actually make the laws, they operate under the rule of law and simply maintain it, so realistically the threat to our defense comes from the Home Office (who have given us that defense in the 1st place and can easily take it away again) unless Parliament amends the VCRA and bans air weapons completely or performs a similar action (which of course is something the Scottish parliament has expressed a desire to do should they gain additional powers from Westminster). Of course religious influences, pressure groups (like MAG), retailers/sellers breaking the law or an incident involving an IF/RIF/Airgun could agitate the situation and force the hand of Politicians to make that move. A lone politician isn't going to be able to change anything on thier own either but we all know that if one makes a fuss, many wont bother looking at the facts and will yay or nay any movement depending on what they had for breakfast.


*edit* yeah small wall of text and I'm too lazy to clean it up.

[jagillham]

Re: Just how safe do you think our legal defence is?

I'd bet anything that there will be an "incident" which catches the tabloids eye.

Most of the rushed legislation (the kind badly thought out etc) is cobbled together to calm a back lash. Look at the Dangerous Dogs act!

One quiet news day, some kind of "incident", tabloid campaign, and a government looking for a spending cut distraction. It's a lethal mix!

Again with the Dangerous Dogs Act, were loads of kids suddenly eaten by dogs in the early 1990's.... or did the newspapers suddenly make a big thing of an existing situation?

[Abbadon101]

Re: Just how safe do you think our legal defence is?

The only thing I can realistically see changing the current laws is some major head line grabbing event like a kid with a RIF being shot by ARU or some thing along those lines. Any thing else wouldn't put enough pressure on the Government to get them to change anything.

Airsoft has been in the UK a while now and if they really wanted to get rid of it the would have with the VCRA.

[cannon_fodder]

Re: Just how safe do you think our legal defence is?

As with all modern laws in this country we are at the mercy of Newspaper editors and Daily Mail readers.

If some event with a RIF hits the headlines then this sport is doomed.
Over the last 20 years ALL ministers react without thinking to ANY bad publicity. Two nutters with firearms certificates going postal = BAN all handguns instead of 'stop nutters getting certificates'.
2 Dog attacks = ban 1 breed of dog instead of bringing in micro chipping + dog licence for owners.

If the papers report 1 front page story about RIFs then the quickest way for any politician to score 'points' with the voters is to suggest banning RIFs.

until then we are quite safe as we are such a small hobby that no one cares enough to warrent the effort to ban us.

[Caveira]

Re: Just how safe do you think our legal defence is?

For information, Barney got it in 12 minutes.

Our defence is not written into VCRA, it was tacked on by the Home Secretary. So the Home Secretary can take it away with no reference to anyone at all.

The courts could decide that the current law breaches some other (superior) law, as they did years ago and ruled that the age 60 retirement age for women was against equality laws and re-wrote pensions law overnight.

The police could, in theory, request a judicial review of the defence. This is highly unlikely, but it has been done in relation to some driving offences and this ended up with some things being made legal and others being decriminalised.

Bottom line, we have to be careful. As said above, all it will need is a stupid mistake from an airsofter (or someone who has bought a RIF using our defence) and the Home Secretary can put pen to paper and there goes our defence. Obviously, we would still be able to own as taking that right away would need new legislation, but they did that with the pre-charged cartridge air guns and people either had to surrender them with no compensation, or apply for a section 5 firearms licence (after proving that both they and they're pet pig can levitate!).

My biggest fear now relates to David Cameron's habit of walking from number 10 to parliament. If his CP team catch someone with a legally bought RIF, we are in for big trouble.