Violent Crime Reduction Bill

I am not going to be quite so short, because while of course we object to the point of principle that the noble Lord has enunciated, it is worth putting on the record why we feel it is right and necessary to introduce the measure that we have. Although gun crime is low overall—it counts for something like 0.4 per cent of all recorded crime—it has been rising. In 2001–02, handguns were used in 5,871 crimes, an increase of 46 per cent on the previous year. Handguns were used in 58 per cent of armed crime. There were 97 fatalities and 558 serious injuries resulting from crimes involving firearms. Some of this, as we all readily acknowledge, is associated with gang culture, which itself is much linked to the illegal drug trade. The Government are determined to tackle this serious problem. We want to deter criminals from using firearms and ensure that they receive appropriately tough sentences on conviction. That is worth saying, because it is important that people understand that we have made progress. In 2004–05, as I explained earlier, there was a 5 per cent decrease in the number of crimes in which firearms were used. Handgun offences fell by 15 per cent and the number of firearm crimes resulting in serious or fatal injury fell by 5 per cent. The most recent statistics, for the year ending December 2005, show that firearm offences excluding air weapons were down 3 per cent and that fatal injuries, thankfully, were down 30 per cent. We contend that our strategy on tackling gun crime is working and we feel that the minimum sentence has played a part in that. But there is more to do. We cannot rest on our laurels. Gun crime is still a serious problem and we need to maintain our efforts to combat it. If we were to accept the noble Lord’s amendment at this point, it would be sending exactly the wrong message. We need to maintain our commitment and demonstrate to those who seek to conduct their lives in a world of criminality that we are serious about putting them out of circulation and taking appropriate measures to tackle something that, while it is a diminishing problem for the moment, is a problem that we need to be vigilant in tackling.