Guns on school campus - uk

[Bambala]

This is a side thread to another one I started, there was quite a lot of interesting information about guns and shooting at UK schools that people posted on the first thread and I thought might be worth exploring. Just wondering how many schools in UK offer shooting and what the rules and regs are about keeping guns in close proximity to children. It makes me feel uncomfortable to think there are guns kept at schools but I am assuming the safety regulations are very stringent?

My dc had a rifle range at school but they were pretty unusual (boarding)

My dp's school had a rifle range and an amount when he was there (grammar school with a cadet force). He said he was told that the armoury required two different keys to open and they were not held by the same person. Allegedly this was reduce the likelihood of a lost key being used by a pupil to gain access to the weapons.

Lots of schools have them. The ammunition is never live and they are extremely tightly controlled in my experience.
All the articles I've read state that this poor lady's husband had his own gun (with live ammo) registered to him, which was nothing at all to do with the school or its rifle range.

If ammunition is not live, it’s not ammunition. No point in having a rifle range unless there is ammunition and rifles to use.

There will be live ammunition but it will be kept separately from the rifles, possibly even off site.

Lots of boarding/grammar/private schools will have combined cadet force detachments.

Interesting- I always thought the ammunition they were using for target practice with the 22s was so called 'blanks'. In any event the one at our school was Fort Knox and policed by a number of staff members. The one at my kids' last school was similar.
Doesn't change the fact that this guy had his own gun registered to him though. Nothing to do with the school's range.

Blanks are no good for target shooting as nothing (beyond remnants, no actual bulket) comes out. Blanks will be used by cadets for the pretend warfare (exercises). Armouries have very strict rules.

Unfortunately this case seems to be a privately owned shotgun, of which there are thousands of people with licenses for.

I would have thought it was a bit dodgy to allow someone (albeit the Head’s husband), with a personal gun licence and their own shotgun and ammunition anywhere near school premises, let alone living in them. I wonder if the school Governors knew?

Both my prep and my boarding grammar had ranges.

Prep school we had airguns.
Secondary we had .22 rifles on the indoor range and .303 rifles on the outdoor range. This particular school had a lot of Forces children, a very active CCF and a high percentage of children went into the Forces after university/Sandhurst.

Airguns were single pellet loading. Rifles were bolt action and took a clip of 6 bullets.

All shooting was supervised and there was a big process around signing the guns in and out of the armoury (including having to swear we had no ammo in our possession, including spent shell cases).

Ammo was given out on the ranges and all accounted for by the staff members. And the Armourer was ex-Forces and terrifying. I have no idea how things were stored in the Armoury as nobody got to go past the counter ever. It was like Fort Knox.

It was my main sport for well over a decade.

We did get to run around on night exercises with Lee Enfields and a couple of blanks each. I suppose that could have ended badly, but in the 5 years I did those the worst injuries were bramble scratches and the odd twisted ankle.

DD's schools don't shoot, but we live rurally. I know of accidents when I was a child where children came across guns and played around with them. So DD has had instruction in shooting from a young age - she knows how to handle guns and how to make them safe and be safe around them.

I would assume that most of the big boys or co-ed boarding schools would have a range or access to one (they're often shared with local gun clubs, or cadet groups).

There’s a fairly complex process before obtaining a shotgun licence. Applications, police interviews, background checks and a house inspection to see if you have separate secure locations for the guns and ammunition. You need a reason to own the gun with membership of a gun club most common reason. Alternatively professional reasons to own one can entitle you to a licence, farmers, gamekeepers, pest control etc.

Once you do have a licence though, the relicensing process becomes a bit routine. As long as you’re not holding up banks or waving it around in public then there’s no major drama. I’m not sure if gp’s have to sign off on your mental health status but if you don’t wander into the surgery with your underpants on your head, two pencils up your nose saying wibble then they may not know.

There are thousands of law abiding firearms owners who contribute very little to the gun crime statistics. Saying that, I know at least two licensed firearms owners who I wouldn’t trust with a balloon and a sharp stick.

I do think that school accommodation shouldn't be allowed to have guns legally registered to that address. This may not be the law now so I'm not suggesting the police administration who allowed the permit to transfer to the new address were at fault but I think boarding school accommodation should have a higher standard applied. It already is treated differently in that you need to have a DBS to live there even if not employed by the school, so I don't see why the rules around personal guns kept at home can't also be changed to red flag any school accommodation. (I live in school accommodation myself.)

If it had been a normal relationship she would have been able to say to her husband "the gun can't come with us when we move" but she likely had already been experiencing DV/coercive control and felt she couldn't say no.

Completely agree with all this. It's such a horrible tragedy. Sickening.

There’s a fairly complex process before obtaining a shotgun licence. Applications, police interviews, background checks and a house inspection to see if you have separate secure locations for the guns and ammunition. You need a reason to own the gun with membership of a gun club most common reason. Alternatively professional reasons to own one can entitle you to a licence, farmers, gamekeepers, pest control etc

Very little of the above is correct for a SG... Its a lengthy process for a shotgun grant but not complex.

20 mins for online application £89
GP Med report £60 (approx) which must be factual, not an opinion on suitability.
Metal gun cabinet fixed to wall £50 to £250.

A shotgun is anything from £150 to £20k plus & 1000 cartridges costs a min £250, clay pigeon users will go through 100 per day.

You need a reference from a professional person inc a company director, so your mate who owns a plumbing business can sign.

No reason to own one has to be given at all, the police might ask verbally nor do you need to be in a gun club.

The Police will inspect the cabinet is firmly fixed to a secure part of the house. shot gun cartridges don't need to be locked away either, just out of sight, unless you have more 10,000... keys for cabinet should be in a key safe or another out of sight place that only you know about.

You have mixed up a shotgun grant with a firearms licence, ie a rifle, firing bullets, these do carry the restrictions you mention.