The Forum members met with Police yesterday. Below is a summary of the main points.
The Regulations will come into effect on the 11th of December. There will be a 6 month Grace period for owners to either convert to E or comply with A.
Two new forms have been constructed for the purpose of moving an A to E one for those already with an E endorsement and one for those that do not have an E endorsement but wish to obtain one. It would appear that you still need justify why you need an E endorsement. From what I can fathom ownership of the rifle itself may not be reason enough.
Police will roll out a full communication plan in the next few weeks.
It would appear that there are a number of thumb hole stocks coming to market. GC will not be the only option.
During the Grace Period the Police will take a consultative approach but if you still have your pistol grip attached to the rifle and cannot demonstrate that you are waiting on an appropriate A cat stock or that you have started the E cat process then the Police will be looking to "discuss things with you". (Take that as you will). Just like having a large capacity magazine on your premises ownership of a pistol grip will now attract the same type of interest from Police if you do not have an endorsed licence. My take on this is if you decide to stay A cat don't just throw your old pistol grip in the draw, get rid of it.
A semi automatic without any pistol grip is A cat, however Police will take an interest in your reason for having the firearm in this condition.
The current situation with Import permits was discussed and I made it clear that it made doing business with US based suppliers can be difficult as they want documentation. Police agreed to look at how to help here. We asked if Customs could be at the next meeting so we could make them aware of our concerns.
It was made clear that this whole pistol grip change was being driven politically. Again take that as you will.
It was interesting to get an insight into Police mindset. They want All front line Police to be easily able to define A from E at a glance. Why? It may be related to the fact that Police have been very successful in upping their arrest rates at car crash sites and domestic incidents; by interviewing all onlookers and checking their details and their vehicles lots of people are being caught for things like outstanding warrants, unpaid fines etc.
My take on it is that Police may be looking to enforce a higher level of compliance when it comes to the way Firearms owners act. This is of course just my opinion and I could be wrong but the mindset seems to indicate a strong drive for compliance.
Bookmarks