GUN SALES ON eBAY
October
2004
At a press conference at the Labour Party Conference
in Brighton, a number of members of GCN joined forces with Steve McCabe
MP to highlight the sale of guns on the eBay auction site.
eBay's stated policy is not to deal in guns.
Nevertheless, its customers have been invited to bid for empty boxes or
gun mountings with which they received the "free gift" of a gun.
Deactivated guns and handbooks needed to reactivate them have been
offered for sale. In spite of eBay's policy guns for auction are
also advertised openly. On one day, for example, 51 weapons were
tracked on the site. Most of these are airguns, but some of the
weapons, including a Czech CZ75 pistol priced at £650, are feared to be
working firearms whose sale in the UK would be illegal under any
circumstances. Unscrupulous sellers are using the site to get
around the gun laws.
Given the increasing levels of crime involving air
guns, replica weapons and blank-firing pistols (see our lists of
Gun incidents) we are concerned that
there is no control over purchases of these guns made through eBay.
They could be obtained by children under the age of 17 who would not be
allowed to buy them in shops.
We have urged eBay to police their site more
rigorously and ensure that guns are not made available.
For more information see:
