Paraphrasing now, but IRISH LAW (as amended by 2017 EU) states that any persons caught in possession of a magazine that can hold more than (20 for pistol) or more than (10 for rifle), for a FIREARMS CERTIFICATE they hold OF THE SAME CALIBRE, is F0CKED. ( EU allowed grandfathering, but of course Ireland didn't)

This isn't true. Technically no CF magazine is banned, only loading devices are but that doesn't mean anything. But if you're erring on the side of caution, only magazine that can be used in centrefire semi automatic rifles or pistols aren't allowed. So if your rifle uses AR mags, best to stick to the 10 rounders, but if it's a proprietary magazine you're in the clear.

Let me give you the simplified version of all this.

In Ireland;

10 rounds for any LONG firearm, be it, CF or CF restricted, .22 rifled or shotgun is the legal limit. [Now in national legislation and EU directive]It is irrespective of whether the mag[ and talking CF here] is compatible with a semi-auto CF or a proprietary mag.

20 rounds for a CF pistol.No change

5 Rounds for a .22 pistol as a non-restricted firearm. [There are some freaks out there with restricted 10 round .22 pistols, but its not a norm so not one to be concerned about]

Under the directive and Irish law. You CANNOT now possess legally any magazine body, that is CAPABLE of holding more than 10 or 20 rounds respectively for any firearm that would fit in your possession. So even permanently blocking your SACF mag to ten rounds is illegal under the directive. It cannot be physically capable of having the space to hold more than 10/20 rounds inc the spring and follower and base plate.Only choice is if it is an original mag and unique, is to physically cut the mag in half and rework it to hold ten rounds only.

Simples🙄

I'd assume he is referring to the fact that "loading device" is not defined in Irish law.

I agree that it's a awkward choice of words, but I think you'd have a tough time selling the idea that it was referring to something other than magazines and the like. IIRC the US mag ban used the term "ammunition feeding device".

Obviously the guys with the CF pistols are grandfather licenses (Pre-2009).

Are the 10 round 22 RF pistol on similar licenses? Presumably they are holding restricted pistol licenses. In which case would their limit be in theory (if a magazine was manufactured in that capacity). 20? 30?

Mellor really hit the nail on the head. It's not defined under Irish or EU legislation and can mean a lot of different things, whether it be those speed loaders for magazines or something else. Also Cat A firearms are allowed to be kept that were licensed prior to the 31st of August 2019, and this covers CF SA rifles with a "loading device capacity" of over 10 rounds, and this sort of brings up an interesting scenario, if you have a license to possess 11+ round mags, how can you have said license revoked for being in possession of said magazines? Bit of a contradiction in the legislation.

Let's not forget about compensation. I know we've discussed this in the past and you did explain it to me, but I still can't get my head around the EU saying that ownership of something can be revoked without compensation. Seems very unconstitutional to me. Also the punishment for being in possession of these "loading devices" is having your firearms license revoked, so in other words anyone how doesn't have such a firearms license can own these.

Yeah, nor is it defined under EU law. I emailed someone in the EU about that a while ago, someone in the relevant department who's name escapes me, and they didn't have a clue. Well when I think of loading device I think of something that's used to load magazines.

There is no restriction on capacity for restricted short firearms. The highest capacity mag I saw for a RF pistol was a 25 rounder for a Glock conversion kit.

Not sure where it says anything about a magazine body, but if you put a block or a dowel in a magazine to restrict the capacity to 10, then you're fine. There's no mention of permanence under any legislation that I can think of. Just for your sake Grizz, I hope you didn't chop your mags in half.

This is what the EU directive decided was the definition of a magazine, as it was pointed out to them as to what exactly did they intend to ban was so technically vague as to be unenforceable. So the decision was to go after the literal container[IE the mag body] as the most logical thing to ensure compliance. The next problem was,say you had some exotic that has very few mags commonly available [EG a BM59] . Your only choice to keep it in a Cat B is to use a ten round. Ergo unless you have a talented gunsmith, your only choice would be to cut it to ten rounds. This is what part of the FUNI meet was with the DOJ in Dec 2019 to try and get clarification from the DOJ on this being transposed into Irish law, would such a block be acceptable? And the status of the CAT A firearms being exempt post-2019 here.

NOTE that part of the EU directive RE the CAT A guns been exempt pre-2019 has NOT been transcribed into Irish legislation for whatever reason. So buyer beware on that point.

Sorry I cannot follow this. Not being a dick but its not reading right. The punishment for having such a loading device, after the cut off date, is the revocation of your license. I don't understand the point of the highlighted bit so will wait till you explain before replying.

You are getting this confused with the EU directive on this. There are many EU countries that allow the free collection of magazines without you needing to go to all the hassle of acquiring a firearms permit.As they recognise a mag as being nothing more than a spring in an empty box. So say you collect mags in Germany. You can have any and all types of mags in your collection no problem, from a 20 mm Flack gun to a Kolibri pistol is good.BUT say you have a firearms cert for an AR15. You cannot, absolutely must not have ANY type of mag greater than ten rounds in your mag collection that fits an AR. As if it is inserted it becomes a CAT A prohibited firearm, and you lose that particular firearm and mags from your permit if caught in possesion of both at the same address.

As however in Ireland we treat a magazine as a firearm component under our law, and you must have a relevant permit to possess a firearm.This part of the directive is mostly irrelevant to us.Bar the point that you cannot possess a mag for a long firearm over ten rounds legally anymore here. As the govt also did not avail of the exemption offered by the directive for competitors in disciplines that needed the higher capacity.[1] IPSC is banned in the ROI, which is the main user in Europe and the other is the extreme anti-gun policy of the PTBhere in relation to SACF in general .

Let's not forget about compensation. I know we've discussed this in the past and you did explain it to me, but I still can't get my head around the EU saying that ownership of something can be revoked without compensation. Seems very unconstitutional to me. 

Talk to Poland, Hungary and the Czechs about this. They brought this very point to the EU courts of justice as it contravenes Article 5 [?] of the EUCHR on just and fair compensation for property surrendered for the common good. The EU courts ruled against them. Claiming to own a firearm is a privilege and not a right under EU law, so therefore no compensation is due by a state that decides to ban firearms. However,it could be argued that precedent was set by the UK with the Dunblane and Hungerford bans back when the UK was an EU member.

It is one other reason that the Czech Republic introduced their version of the 2nd amendment into their constitution as a big middle finger to Brussels, making them the 2nd only country enshrining gun ownership as a constitutional right.

The EU court is a rather rigged affair IMO. We have seen in the Covid years it stating that being able to refuse an inoculation personally or on your children is not an absolute right either it is outweighed by the "common good" thus violating another article of EUCHR of the right to bodily integrity. Seems the EUCHR isn't worth the fancy paper its written on.

It’s no wonder this thread has gained long legs; Irish Laws/Regs are FUBAR and not fit for a modern society.

I see 3,000 odd obsolete laws are to be removal from Irish statute books, this is probably the tip of the iceberg............

We DID point this out to them in the Dail public inquiry back in 2017[?] So am wondering is this Min James Browne planning to review this in its entirety and do something of value to reform this all.Or just use us for a political ladder-climbing exercise?

Only applies to Cat B firearms. Only semi auto long firearms are mentioned, so doesn't apply to non restricted firearms.

Nope, not in the slightest, repeating firearms are defined under the 2008 order and aren't Cat B but can't be owned by Cat B firearm owners.

“repeating firearms” means firearms that are loaded and reloaded from a magazine or cylinder by a manually-operated mechanism;

Very much so, however this would be similar to the current handgun and shotgun magazine rules, and a wooden dowel has been fine since 2008.

There is an exemption for Cat A firearms covered under section 2(7) of the directive. So no, magazines for Cat A aren't banned outright, but I highly doubt that anyone will be able to get an authorization for them.

I will admit that I made a mistake about all Cat A firearms being grandfathered, only ones covered under section 2(7), as mentioned above.

I heard that mentioned before, but that would still be Cat A. However it does mention in section 2D(3) "This section shall not apply to — the possession, in accordance with an authorisation under section 2(7), of a firearm classified in Category A of the Directive". So there is a potential exemption for sports shooting. So yeah, it was put into the Irish law.

No, it wasn't! There was an exemption in the EU directive for countries to include this exemption in their national firearms laws.Irelanjd never took that exemption.This was another point we tried to get sorted when FUNI met with the DOJ. The DOJ refused to consider this exemption for two reasons;[1] The policy of reduction of ownership of firearms by DOJ/AGS/Irish Govt in the hands of Irish citizens, particularly semi-auto firearms. and [2] That the main users of this exemption is IPSC,which of course is banned in Ireland. We don't have any other disciplines that use over 10 shots here...So what's our reason for an exemption? Case closed!

The only Cat A firearm I know you can license is a CF pistol and SACF rifle, however under part 7 of the Category A listings those are restricted to loading devices of not more than 20 rounds and 10 rounds respectively.

Nope. They are now CAT B As a CAT A [prohibited is per the directive] A former select-fire weapon that has been converted to semi-auto or has been converted to a blank-firing firearm, still with full auto function[With the exemption of basically the Swiss veterans being able to keep their converted SIG assault rifles].The only way you can really own a CAT A type of gun is to have it torn down and into a parts kit and rebuilt into a CAT B using non-military parts and have any removed that create select fire.OR have it converted into a Cat B straight-pull bolt action.

Your CAT B[3] becomes a prohibited CAT A weapon is when you insert a mag into it that has over 10 or 20 shots respectively into it.

Munsterlad102 - Very much so, however this would be similar to the current handgun and shotgun magazine rules, and a wooden dowel has been fine since 2008.

Won't work with the CF SA mags.It's there in B&W in the EU directive as to what they are after and that's the body of the mag. Believe me ,this has been argued back and forth in Brussels, the Bundestag and all over Europe that was affected. If it could have been done, to keep or block the mags to 10 rounds it would have been done.In short,it is and became a gigantic clusterf22k, all over the EU.With this vagueness

Magazine or loading device? If the latter, then I concede, but if the former then that doesn't have any impact on the "loading device" debacle because there is no mention of a magazine in the directives, nor do they draw any links between the two.

Check again,I think it is in the directive[final version and adapted] a definition of a loading device?

Where does it say that? A magazine doesn't really fit any of the numerous definitions of a firearm, but one is arguable.

If the law treats a bunch of wooden stock screws as firearm components. How do you think it will treat you as possessing a critical piece of a firearm?