SIR: After reading (BEN October 24) the story with the headling: Television has nothing on real life crime - MP, referring to Tom Sackville MP, I realised how ignorant he is on the subject.
Machine Pistols are not pistols at all, but the correct name for sub-machine guns, outlawed in this country since 1938.
He states that you can hire a U21 sub-machine gun in Manchester in a matter of minutes. Surely the correct thing to do with this information would be to inform the police so they can arrest the gunmen.
He also states that criminals do not want unexciting small bore guns. Again he is totally wrong; he could not be further from the truth. Ammunition is the primary concern of the criminal and .22 ammo is the most common in this country used by farmers, fairground shooting galleries, the TA etc. It is small, easy to conceal and the pistol's .22 can be bought openly on the Continent, and, as the border controls are now non-existent, brought back to this country with ease. Small bore pistols are also far easier to conceal, far better than their much larger full bore pistols they cannot easily obtain ammunition for.
As a Minister of State, one would hope that he would study the subject. Obviously he has not. It is the most ridiculous statement I have read so far on the subject.
Brian S Ford, Farnworth
Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.
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