Firearms licensing goes further downhill

Majority of forces missing targets

The backlog of temporary firearms permits issued by police forces in England and Wales has continued to grow, with the latest quarterly figures from the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) showing little improvement on an already poor picture.

Twenty of England and Wales’s 43 forces are meeting the target of processing eight in ten applications within four months. Among the forces failing to meet that target, the worst performers are barely turning around one in three applications in time.

BASC head of firearms Martin Parker said: “This results in forces having to issue temporary permits, or for certificate holders to have to put their guns into storage. As the emphasis is on renewals, these forces are taking one to two years, sometimes more, to grant new certificates.”

In Cambridgeshire, 779 certificate holders are on temporary permits; Hertfordshire has 506, Bedfordshire 476 and Humberside 424. Humberside’s total has risen from 361 last quarter to 424, whilst Sussex has jumped from 44 to 108, nearly trebling in a single quarter.

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Best-performing forces highlighted

A handful of forces are setting the example. Cheshire and Merseyside are processing nearly all applications on time, with Lincolnshire, Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Cumbria and Cleveland all above 95%. But it is Scotland’s example that throws the failures into sharpest relief.

“Recent figures from Police Scotland showed their licensing department to be the equal of the very best of the English and Welsh forces,” said Mr Parker. “How is it that they consistently meet expectations, and have done so for the last five years, yet many of their counterparts in England and Wales appear to be on a slippery downward slope?” 

He added: “It is incumbent on the chair of the Firearms and Explosives Licensing Working Group to hold those forces that are failing the shooting community to account.”