Just looking now at a picture in a book called 'The Gun Collector's Fact Book' of U.S. cops throwing bundles of guns into Long Island Sound. Mostly civil war period stuff but I can see a lever action there and some doubles; must be a couple of hundred. Book was published in 1975 but it doesn't say when the picture was taken. That one would make you blanch too. Any idea what that was about?
English gun law is just plain odd. We actually have less restrictions that you do in some cases. For shotguns we apply to the local Police for a certificate. They then, by law, have to issue that certificate unless they can prove that the applicant is unsuitable such as being a criminal, insane or a wife beater and habitual drunkard; that sort of thing. No lower age limit to the application but kids under 15 have to be accompanied by someone over 21 and can't buy, but can own one, until they reach 18. No limit to the amount of guns that one can then own and buy at any one time. Some shotguns don't even need that. Rifles are a bit different in that the certificate applicant just has to show a reason for owning it such as target shooting, vermin destruction or deer stalking. Lower age limit of that one is 14 and can go out unaccompanied at 14. Pistols are the difficult one as the Dictator Tony Blair banned them, other than for use as a humane killer for licensed animal slaughterers. I have an air pistol; under 6ft. lb. no problem, over 6 ft. lb. means 5 years minimum mandatory prison sentence. As I say, just odd. No problems with sound moderators like you have; in fact their use is often encouraged because of noise pollution. Tracer ammo has no particular restrictions either.
Each country seems to have some anomalies that gun owners face. I understand that there are a lot of restrictions for gun ownership in New York city, Washington city and Chicago and each State has different laws on ownership. England and Wales are the same, Scotland broadly the same except air gun ownership is a bit odd and Northern Ireland citizens can still own pistols because, according to Blair, there was little evidence in N. Ireland concerning violence with handguns. No, I suppose there they just use mortars, rocket launchers and milk churns filled with semtex! U.K. gun laws are currently under review in order to make them less complex. I'm not holding my breath on that one! Lagopus.....
