Results of Handgun Confiscation in the UK
UK Ban On Handguns Has Not Lowered Gun Crime Figures
http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewForeignBureaus.asp?Page=%5CForeignBureaus%5Carchive%5C200101%5CFor20010111e.html
... Last year [2000], 3,685 crimes were committed by perpetrators armed with illegal handguns, including 43 murders, 310 attempted murders and 2,561 robberies, according to Home Office figures released to parliament. It is the highest number in seven years.
In 1997 the incoming Labor government banned possession of all handguns after a gunman at a school in the town of Dunblane killed 16 children and their teacher. The ban extended to all handguns an earlier, partial ban instituted by the former administration.
By a deadline in September that year, some 100,000 privately owned firearms were surrendered to the police. Anyone caught in possession of one after that date was liable to a jail term of up to 10 years.
Richard Law, the secretary of the Shooters' Rights Association, said Thursday the new statistics showed the ban was wrong.
"We took the view at the time the government was imposing the ban that it would have no effect on armed crime, and we said they were penalizing the wrong people," he said in an interview.
"The government was claiming these measure would reduce crime. From previous statistics, we knew they were lying, but this is what they claimed."
Law attributed the move to a "knee-jerk reaction" by the government to pressure from the media demanding drastic action after Dunblane. "It's one of the most blatant examples I think of political scapegoating on record."
Illegal weapons were still circulating in large numbers, and would continue to be, he said. Yet licensed owners were the ones penalized.
... Britain's sports minister, Kate Hoey in the year 2000, conceded in a magazine interview earlier that the handgun ban had done nothing to stop criminals from obtaining weapons.
"I represent [the electoral constituency of] Vauxhall in London where there's a substantial number of illegal weapons on the black market, very easily available, and I'm not sure that the handgun ban has done anything to prevent illegal weapons getting into the wrong hands."
Hoey said that after the Dunblane shooting and another in Hungerford a decade earlier, "there was a kind of attitude that somehow there must be something slightly wrong with anyone who was involved in shooting. I knew this to be untrue and I thought even some of my colleagues in the House of Commons took a very unfair attitude."
The Centre for Defence Studies at Kings College in London, which carried out the research, said the number of crimes in which a handgun was reported increased from 2,648 in 1997/98 to 3,685 in 1999/2000.
[Read that last sentence again: in the first two years following disarming law-abiding citizens, crime involving handguns rose by almost 40%!]
Gun crime rises despite Dunblane pistol ban
The Telegraph, Philip Johnston, Home Affairs Editor. 2001/07/17
"HANDGUN crime increased by 40 per cent in the two years after the ban imposed because of the Dunblane massacre, according to a new study."
http://portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2001/07/17/nhand17.xml
Gun crimes soaring despite ban brought in following Dunblane
The Telegraph, David Bamber, Home Affairs Correspondent. 2001/07/15
"An independent report, Illegal Firearms in the UK, to be published by the Centre for Defence Studies at King's College in London tomorrow, says that handguns were used in 3,685 offences last year compared with 2,648 in 1997, an increase of 40 per cent."
http://portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2001/07/15/ngun15.xml
London gun crime rockets
This Is London, Justin Davenport, Crime Correspondent. 2002/07/08
"Crime in Britain is rocketing with sharp rises in gun and violence offences, figures will reveal this week."
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/londonlife/articles/435430
Gun crime trebles as weapons and drugs flood British cities
David Bamber, Home Affairs Correspondent. 2002/02/24
"GUN crime has almost trebled in London during the past year and is soaring in other British cities, according to Home Office figures obtained by The Telegraph."
http://www.allsafedefense.com/news/International/BritGunCrimeTrebles.htm
Failure of British Gun Control: Did British Gun Control Work?
Iain Murray, United Press International. 2001/06/21
"These figures speak for themselves. Britain enacted strict gun control laws and has achieved a rise in gun crime, a decline in safety and a position where access to firearms among delinquent children seems commonplace."
http://www.allsafedefense.com/news/International/BritsFailure.htm
Handgun crime soars despite Dunblane ban
The Telegraph, Thomas Harding. 2001/01/11
"The use of illegal weapons rose dramatically with 42 people killed. ... The total was more than a third up on the previous year, according to figures given in a parliamentary written answer by Lord Bassam of Brighton, a Home Office minister."
http://portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=BOFVQ4V3RPTO3QFIQMGSFF4AVCBQWIV0?xml=/news/2001/01/11/ngun11.xml
Dunblane gun law has been failure
The Telegraph. 2001/12/28
"Colin Greenwood, a retired police officer and leading expert on firearms law, has argued persuasively that gun control legislation has been an abject failure."
http://portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2001/12/28/ngun28.xml&sSheet=/news/2001/12/28/ixhome.html
Hoey criticises ban on handguns
The Telegraph, David Sapsted. 2001/01/02
"THE post-Dunblane ban on handgun possession has done nothing to stop criminals getting their hands on firearms, according to Kate Hoey, the sports minister."
http://portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=BOFVQ4V3RPTO3QFIQMGSFF4AVCBQWIV0?xml=/news/2001/01/02/nhoey02.xml
Massive rise in gun murders
This Is London, Justin Davenport, Crime Correspondent. 2001/12/19
"Gun crime in London is rocketing, with increases of almost 90 per cent in some firearms offences, Scotland Yard revealed today."
http://www.allsafedefense.com/news/International/BritainMurdersIncrease.htm
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"No man shall ever be debarred the use of arms. The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government."
-- Thomas Jefferson