Legality of allowing a child to handle a firearm

Tuttlinghorn

My child was recently allowed to handle a firearm which ( I'm told - I wasn't there) was decommissioned.
10 yr old child - is this legal ?
I don't plan on suing anyone or making a complaint to Gardai, but I need to help the person who had responsibility for my child at the time to understand why I'm unhappy.

Grolschevik

I can understand why you might be displeased, but I don't think it's illegal.

Edit: assuming it was decommissioned and whatever associated licensing conditions were complied with.

Manach

Many decommissioned firearms have a historical significance - hence it would be education to examine one. Given that kitchen knives have more effect that the lump of inert metal that is now such an object, then I'd not be aware of any direct laws and in case, only the very edge/fact-specific cases in tort about emotional damage.

Kings Inns or bust

Surely the way to communicate your displeasure would be to say:

"I as a parent find this unacceptable" rather than,

"Under the Parents and Teachers Act 1987 I believe you have committed an offence under Section 9(3)"

If you prefer the latter I'd suggest just making it up as I just did.

FWIW I think all children should get proper firearms training. I did from the age of about 13 and it changed the way I thought about guns completely. I still remember to this day being given a wooden rifle for drill training and a WO going absolutely fecking mental that we were aiming them at each other.

Tuttlinghorn

Kings Inns or bust wrote: »

Surely the way to communicate your displeasure would be to say:

"I as a parent find this unacceptable" rather than,

"Under the Parents and Teachers Act 1987 I believe you have committed an offence under Section 9(3)"

If you prefer the latter I'd suggest just making it up as I just did.

FWIW I think all children should get proper firearms training. I did from the age of about 13 and it changed the way I thought about guns completely. I still remember to this day being given a wooden rifle for drill training and a WO going absolutely fecking mental that we were aiming them at each other.

Thanks. Displeasure has been communicated, I was just curious as to the law governing firearms handling / possession.
Btw what's a WO? Were / are you a cadet?

Tuttlinghorn

Manach wrote: »

Many decommissioned firearms have a historical significance - hence it would be education to examine one. Given that kitchen knives have more effect that the lump of inert metal that is now such an object, then I'd not be aware of any direct laws and in case, only the very edge/fact-specific cases in tort about emotional damage.

Thanks. AK47 = Not the kind of education a ten year old needs, in my view. In any case thanks for your response & opinion on its treatment in law

Kings Inns or bust

Tuttlinghorn wrote: »

Thanks. Displeasure has been communicated, I was just curious as to the law governing firearms handling / possession.
Btw what's a WO? Were / are you a cadet?

I was but in the sense of the UK cadets rather than the term used here to describe someone training for the Defence Force. After spending many happy years on ranges, flying various training aircraft and numerous exercises I failed the medical here for the RDF on the basis of a red/green colour defect. I'd be a danger on the range don't you know! :rolleyes:

Anyway that digression aside - obviously the control of firearms is very tightly controlled. Depending on the surrounding circumstances a crime may have been committed. I'm not sure what purpose it serves to research that though if you've explained that, as you have every right to as a parent, you do not find whatever happened to be acceptable.

Have a google of the firearms acts, you may find something there. I'm pretty sure the thread will get closed though if an open discussion happens now as it's been made clear this is not a hypothetical.

***Anecdote Alert*** ***Anecdote Alert*** ***Anecdote Alert***

WO = Warrant Officer. They came in two flavours Cadet and Adult and the majority of them being as mad a hatters. I fondly remember our Squadron's AWO continually going on about suspicious packages...

Anyway he left a briefcase 'hidden' under a desk near his office only to discover a cadet sitting at the desk kicking it. Suffice it to say it became a point of fun, to the point of a cadet Flight Sgt. (Probably around 18/19) declaring that he had found a 'suspicious package' only to bring the same AWO out to a 5 gallon drum marked 'bomb' used for various exercises.

Another one who used to run drill and leadership courses at RAF Halton managed, no doubt with great resourcefulness, to appear in front of a full parade of 40 Cadets at 5am on a baltic November morn tucking into a 99 complete with two flakes. This was his answer to 'it being too cold' to form up awaiting his arrival.

My point? Well I don't really have one other than to say if it was the right sort of environment sometimes kids benefit from seeing the real world a bit. Not that I'm suggesting that you should raise your child in any other way than you see fit.

NUTLEY BOY

Prima facie it is hard to see an offence if this was a decommissioned weapon and the tactile experience took place in a proper context.

OP does not say where this happened. Was it in a museum ?

In my school we had an old rifle - firing pin removed - and we kept taking it out of it's glass case at least once a day to shoot each other imaginatively. I get that this would be frowned on to-day but context does matter

L1011

The Defence Forces allow children to handle disabled (or in some cases, simply not loaded) arms at open days etc. I suspect if it was illegal, this would not be done.

seamus

Tuttlinghorn wrote: »

Thanks. Displeasure has been communicated, I was just curious as to the law governing firearms handling / possession.
Btw what's a WO? Were / are you a cadet?

Question 10 here:
http://www.justice.ie/en/JELR/Pages/FAQ

Assuming that the weapon was bought/acquired before April this year, they should have explicit permission from the local super to possess this weapon.

cruizer101

A decommissioned gun is more or less just a lump of metal I can't see how it would be illegal. No different to a toy gun really. Can I ask why you have an issue with it?

Pat Mustard

Tuttlinghorn wrote: »

I need to help the person who had responsibility for my child at the time to understand why I'm unhappy.

If you like, this thread can be moved to the parenting forum.

Homer

Snowflake generation FTW :cool:

NUTLEY BOY

Tuttlinghorn wrote: »

My child was recently allowed to handle a firearm which ( I'm told - I wasn't there) was decommissioned.
10 yr old child - is this legal ?
I don't plan on suing anyone or making a complaint to Gardai, but I need to help the person who had responsibility for my child at the time to understand why I'm unhappy.

OP I may have missed something here.

Why precisely are you unhappy about what happened ?

Also, I would be interested to know the exact context within which the event occurred as that would be quite relevant in determining what legal implications, if any, might arise.

Sparks

If it was at one of the locations specified in Section 2(4) or 2(3) of the firearms act then it was perfectly legal. Otherwise it was in breach of the firearms act and your child was in possession of an unlicenced firearm, but the person who gave it to them wasn't committing a specific offence.

Nekarsulm

Tuttlinghorn wrote: »

My child was recently allowed to handle a firearm which ( I'm told - I wasn't there) was decommissioned.
10 yr old child - is this legal ?
I don't plan on suing anyone or making a complaint to Gardai, but I need to help the person who had responsibility for my child at the time to understand why I'm unhappy.

Your child can apply for a training licence from age 14 (usually a shotgun) with written consent from a parent or guardian. They can take part in hunting or competition using this firearm only under the supervision of a licenced adult.

So ten is certainly not an excessively early age to be handling a firearm UNDER PROPER SUPERVISION. A lot depends on the level of control the adult supplying the firearm to the school had. I would imagine in your child's classes case, it was strict control.

Sparks

I'm somewhat confused though - normally such a thing would be done on a field trip; I can't remember hearing of people bringing firearms to schools for demonstrations in the last few decades without a lot of paperwork and much discussion - and even in those cases, it was an after-hours olympic sports club, not an in-hours sort of thing. And I was under the impression that field trips still required parental permission to be explicitly given.

So how did the OP's child wind up being at a firearms demonstration without prior notice being given to the OP? Regardless of whether you're in favour or set against firearms ownership, the idea of parents not being notified about things like field trips or external instruction outside of the curriculum is something I'd have some very strong objections to.

Gatling

Wonder if it's a wall hanger or even airsoft Ak

Bad_alibi

Gatling wrote: »

Wonder if it's a wall hanger or even airsoft Ak

All you can do is wonder as it appears the OP has had their rant and moved on. Without more info the discussion is pointless.

Cookie_Monster

As a cub scout i went on a tour to Dundalk barracks and got handed a steyr and challenged to try and cock it

but I need to help the person who had responsibility for my child at the time to understand why I'm unhappy.

why are you unhappy?

Kings Inns or bust

I find it a bit unsettling that people can't leave the OP to parent in the way they see fit. I personally see it as a bit overprotective but it's not my child.

Chiparus

Kings Inns or bust wrote: »

I find it a bit unsettling that people can't leave the OP to parent in the way they see fit. I personally see it as a bit overprotective but it's not my child.

There are plenty of nutty people who get upset at the most stupid of things when it comes to "protecting their children"

hullaballoo

I fired a rifle (I don't know anything else about the gun) when I was 8 with minimal instruction and naturally enough gave myself a black eye when the sight kicked back into it because I was resting my eye socket on it. The minimal instruction came from my uncle who later suffered a fate worse than death when I told my mother (his sister.)

Not legal discussion really but there are intra-familial laws that are applicable when it comes to what children can and cannot do and giving a gun to an 8-year-old is a hard no in my book.

Sparks

hullaballoo wrote: »

giving a gun to an 8-year-old is a hard no in my book.

I think if you mean that in the sense shown in tragedy after tragedy in the US where someone just hands an 8-year-old a firearm and says "y'wan there son, have fun", you would be hard pressed to find a dissenting view in this country. In fact I'm pretty sure that you could make a very strong case here that that would qualify as negligence and that the person involved would wind up with their firearms cert revoked, their firearm confiscated and would probably never be able to successfully apply for a certificate in the future, if not suffering more severe penalties. Nobody in this country regards these things as playthings.

However, if you mean it in the sense that 8-year-olds should not be allowed to take part in an organised olympic sport in suitable facilities under suitable instruction, you might find more people than you initially suspected would demur or even outright disagree. I would be far more in favour of my son going to a rifle range than to a GAA pitch for example, because GAA just isn't safe compared to target shooting (and I don't mean "boys will be boys" roughhousing, I mean deaths and serious injuries both traumatic and chronic in nature). And outside of this country, which has a rather unique history in this regard thanks to the Troubles, that would be a normal majority mainstream view (and I mean in the continental EU, not the US).

The context and the details don't just matter here - they're fundamental and critical.

hullaballoo

Hmm, maybe I should have been clearer but I did mean that giving an 8-year-old a gun and no instruction is a problem. I also meant to say that it is a hard no in my family, rather than my book, which might subjectively be the same thing to me but won't be to everyone else.

I'm not anti-gun and I don't have an issue with sports shooting etc. and FWIW, I don't think I've ever disagreed with you on anything you've ever posted on the matter over the course of a long time.

I suppose I was just being a bit flippant.

Sparks

To be fair, if I found someone had taken my son to a rifle range without telling me first, I'd be a lot more irate than the OP was here. I wasn't kidding about being strongly opposed to the idea of the school doing extra-curricular activities without prior notice to parents, it's a major no-no.