The UK’s gun laws are strong, but loopholes exist. The police need the resources to conduct proper, effective checks
As a young police constable, I had to face an armed suspect in a cafe. Equipped only with a truncheon, I stared at the gunman as he aimed his weapon at me and pulled the trigger point-blank at my head. The gun jammed; I was saved from death, but not from recurrent nightmares. Whether because of this experience or in spite of it, I became, during my 30-year police career, a gold firearms commander and oversaw more than 200 operations, which included officers being shot, hostage situations and high-speed firearms chases. I came to respect the power of firearms, but to firmly believe that this is a power that needs to be reserved for the right hands with stringent checks and balances.
How Jake Davison, the 22-year-old man who shot dead five people in Plymouth, came to have a firearms certificate, and how that certificate was reinstated after it had been suspended after allegations of assault, will be the subject of detailed investigations. But a much more wide-ranging debate is needed about how guns should be regulated, how we enforce regulations and whether the postcode lottery of the present system is fit for purpose.
