Countryside Alliance: Shooting Campaign Update

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Countryside Alliance Ireland
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Countryside Alliance

London, UK -(AmmoLand.com)- This is a busy time for the shooting campaigns team.

This week we are attending a meeting of the Medical Evidence Working Group at the Home Office, a roundtable at Europe House with Vicky Ford MEP to discuss the Firearms Directive and a discussion at DEFRA debating the implementation of the Agreement on International Humane Trapping Standards. As always our position on all these issues is that law-abiding shooters and gamekeepers should be allowed to go about their activities without unnecessary government restrictions.

In the case of the Firearms Directive and the Medical Evidence Working Group we are forcefully arguing that the UK already has some of the most stringent gun control legislation in Europe, more than meeting the challenge of keeping firearms out of the hands of wrong-doers. At the Home Office we will be pressing for fairness, efficiency and transparency in any medical involvement in the firearms licensing process. At Europe House we will be resisting any well-meaning but ultimately ineffective changes to UK gun laws, which will serve no purpose except to inconvenience and disadvantage legal shooters. Proposals such as banning semi-automatic rimfires that look like automatic weapons are deeply flawed and we will be saying so.

The Agreement on International Humane Trapping Standards (AIHTS) is a different conversation, but one we will be entering into with equal vigour. It is now almost certain that we will be losing the use of some of our most widely used traps for at least some target species, the battle now is to make this transition as painless as possible for UK gamekeepers and conservationists who rely on these traps for their livelihoods and to protect some of our rarest species. We will be campaigning throughout the implementation of AIHTS to secure the best possible outcome for our members.

We hope you have an enjoyable and successful end to the season, safe in the knowledge that we in shooting campaign are working hard behind the scenes to secure the future of our sport!

Liam Stokes
Head of Shooting Campaigns
Follow Liam on Twitter @LNJStokes

About Countryside Alliance:

The Countryside Alliance is known for its work on wildlife and management, but its agenda is far broader than that incorporating food & farming, local businesses and services and the injustices of poor mobile phone signal and broadband in the countryside. We are anything but a single issue organisation and represent the interests of country people from all backgrounds and geographical locations. With around 100,000 members the Countryside Alliance promotes and protects rural life at Parliament, in the media and on the ground. Our vision is a future for the countryside which both preserves its traditional values and promotes a thriving rural community and economy; a countryside sustainably managed and sustainably enjoyed; a countryside where rural communities have equal access to the facilities and services enjoyed in urban communities; a countryside where people can pursue their businesses, activities and lives in a society that appreciates and understands their way of life.

Join the voice of rural Britain today at www.Countryside-Alliance.org.