UK News
Blair announces new gun-crime measures after fourth murder
Feb 18, 2007, 12:51 GMT
London - Following the deaths by shooting of four young men in London, British Prime Minister Tony Blair announced harsher penalties for possessing firearms Sunday.
Speaking to Britain's BBC television, Blair said that there would be a review of the firearms law and that he favoured lowering the age at which a person could receive a mandatory five-year sentence for owning a gun from 21 to 17.
Currently, the law carries a mandatory three-year sentence for those aged between 17 and 21 who possess a firearm.
Another young man was found shot dead in London Saturday, the fourth victim in two weeks of what appears to be a series of gangland killings.
The latest victim, in his 20s, was found in a car in the capital's East End Hackney district in the early hours, police said. Three teenagers were killed in earlier shootings in southern districts.
Armed police have been patrolling streets following the spate of killings.
Police in Manchester meanwhile were investigating more shootings after men aged 18, 19 and 27 were wounded in the northern English city's Moss Side area late Friday - again suspected gangland victims.
Britain already has one of the toughest legal regimes in the world for illegally possessing weapons.
Blair said that he was considering making membership of a gang a criminal offence and pledged to increase the number of police working to combat youth-gang crime.
He said that his cabinet and the police planned a summit later in the week to discuss gun crime.
Blair described the recent killings as 'shocking,' but denied they reflected the general situation for British young people today.
'It is about a specific problem within a specific criminal culture to do with guns and gangs, which doesn't make it any less serious, incidentally, but I think it's important therefore that we address that actual issue,' he told BBC One's Sunday AM programme.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-AgenturCOMMENT
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Older Talkback
page: 1
Tim's comments are typical of a gun lover. The facts are that London, even with the recent increase in gun violence, has a much lower murder rate than any comparably sized city in the US. Yes -- people with guns kill people... I applaud the UK for their tough laws banning private ownership of handguns.
But, Jeff if the UK is so tough on guns, where are these Gang Members getting them ? The UK has no GUN SHOWS very few legal GUN OWNER'S to steal guns from.
Perhaps they are being smuggled in from Alabama or Virginia ?
When the gun law age is lowered in the UK, the Gangs well only lower the age of their TRIGGER MAN down to under the age of 15 years old!!
criminals kill with firearms.
Here is how a typical U.S. city stacks up:
http://inquirer.philly.com/graphics/murders_map/homicides2006.html
about one gun killing a day.
In Baltimore watching reports about gun violence on the evening news is like watching your favorite T.V. series: Nightly entertainment, every night at the same time. Stay tune ...
Here are 2 more things to think about:
(a) Prime Minister Tony Blair concerned about a few particular homicides in a city? Wow, that is a foreign concept in the U.S. where gun homicide is 2nd nature. If the president of the U.S. complained about a few gun murders in a city that would be very unusual.
(b) If you extrapolate 1 gun murder/day in a city in the U.S. to 100 cities then that is 100 gun murders/day in the U.S. - on par with Iraq. Now, granted the U.S. is about 10 times bigger, but still: I wish U.S. citizens would take it much more seriously; and specifically not try to downplay it with misleading NRA-type propaganda.
“Blair said that he was considering making membership of a gang a criminal offence.... '
In what fantasy world could this be enforced? Or maybe the specific crime with be 'being black with intent' this would give new meaning to the term 'guilty by association'; not the way to go to instill trust in the system I fear.
We do have a higher Gun crime rate than the US.
The way they get the Results is by looking at the size of the country and population, this is why Jamaica is in Third place off the Highest Murder rates.
I do love seeing theese knee jerk reactions by politicians, they might as well give up as they have lost, it will not make a diffrence what law's they pass on possesion of an Illegal Firearm.
I just feel so safe now that the Government is banning Replicas and stopping the sinister trade of Mail Order Air-Guns.
Privately owned shotguns or rifles are hardly ever used in gun crime.
Before handguns were banned in the UK, legally owned handguns were also hardly ever used in gun crime.
The banning of handguns in the UK was simply a knee jerk reaction to a couple of people who did legally own guns going mad and killing several people.
its good the age is lowered but the penalty should be a lot harsher. That's a start to stopping these kinds of crimes. If someone is sentenced to life, that means they should be put away for life, not a maximum of ten years!
http://century.guardian.co.uk/1990-1999/Story/0,,112749,00.html
FYI this is no privatly owned guns are allowed in the uk, I suppose they felt once was enough.
Most handguns in the uk are converted replicas, I hear that a clips worth of shells would cost more than the average gun on the street.
This makes me VERY glad to be in America, where I can have whatever I want as far as defending my home goes. Does anyone remember 'A Clockwork Orange'? Yeah, I want a gang like that breaking into my house when I only have a sword for self defense. If you outlaw guns, the only ones with them will be the govt., and outlaws.
I'd much rather deal with nightly shootings and know that I can still defend myself, rather than have a nanny state tell me that it's not okay to do so.
page: 1
Tim R.Feb 18th, 2007 - 13:53:52
Tony Blair should perhaps consider taking a look at the FBI statistics on this. Where firearm ownership and especially handgun ownership is lowest crime rates and especailly violent crime rates tend to be the highest. The UK already has some of the toughest laws in the world according to this article and still they have murders and shootings. The only thing making this news worthy is Prime Minster Blair's response. London has plenty of violent murders, however most of them in that country happen with knives and blunt force trauma. For the record if you check with the FBI you will find that most murders in this country also happen as a result of blunt force trauma. The only *real* link between guns and crime is that where lawfully owned, possesed and utilized guns are...violent crime is less.
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