Firearms proposal: impact on law-abiding citizens dominates EP committee debate

MEPs will give their views on how best to prevent weapons falling into the hands of terrorists and keep track of cross-border arms transfers in the Internal Market Committee’s kick-off debate on the revision of the EU firearms directive on Tuesday at 9.00. Concerns over the impact that the proposal would have on sport shooters, hunters, collectors, museums and other lawful activities are also among the issues to be discussed by MEPs.

Internal Market Committee chair Vicky Ford (ECR, UK) will steer the legislation through Parliament. The European Commission presented its proposal to the committee on 7 December, which will now kick-off the discussions in order to prepare Parliament's position.

The topics to be addressed include:

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  stricter rules for collectors: the Commission includes them in the scope of the proposed directive, subjecting them to the same authorisation/declaration requirements as private persons,

  banning certain semi-automatic firearms, e.g. those that "resemble" full automatics: private persons would not be permitted to hold them, even if they have been permanently deactivated,

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  the likely impact of the proposal on sport shooters, hunters, museums and other lawful activities,
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  tighter requirements for alarm, signal weapons, blank firers and replicas: these would be added to the list of firearms that must be declared to the authorities. The Commission also proposes that it be empowered to issue technical specifications to ensure that these cannot be turned into firearms,
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  banning distance (online) selling of firearms, their parts and ammunition, other than by dealers and brokers,
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  amending authorisation conditions for acquiring and possessing a firearm (e.g. introducing standard medical tests for issuing or renewing authorisations), and
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  new rules on the marking and traceability of firearms, keeping records of deactivated arms and exchanging information among member states, e.g. on any refusal of authorisation to own a firearm decided by another national authority.

Background

The EU firearms directive (Directive 91/477/EEC as amended by Directive 2008/51/EC) lays down the rules under which private persons can acquire and possess weapons (i.e. civil use of firearms), and also governs transfers of firearms to another EU country.

In the European Agenda on Security for 2015-2020 and its 2016 Work Programme, the Commission promised to review the existing firearms legislation in 2016 to improve information sharing, reinforce traceability, standardise marking, and establish common standards for neutralising firearms.

In the light of the terrorist attacks in Europe last year, it decided to accelerate this work - the revision of the EU firearms directive was tabled on 18 November 2015 -, and also presented an action plan to combat illegal trafficking of weapons and explosives on 2 December 2015.

According to the Commission, recent terrorist attacks included cases in which "firearms were illegally assembled with components legally bought via Internet". Several sources also point to the possible use of reactivated firearms in the 2015 terrorist attacks.

Proposed Internal Market Committee timetable