Zero tolerance for guns

IT IS difficult not to be revulsed by the acts of a lone wolf terrorist in Nevada, US. Once again this great country is being forced to look within, to ponder a legacy law where it is everyone’s right to bear arms, even though the consequences all too often are simply appalling.

Nobody knows what prompted Stephen Paddock to open fire from the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Hotel in Las Vegas. All that anyone knows is that 59 people are dead and more than 500 people have been wounded in America’s most horrific gun crime ever.

Police found an arsenal of 23 firearms in the hotel room Paddock rented to propagate his massacre of country music festivalgoers on the ground below. Officers discovered a further 19 in his home. It’s a staggering statistic. How could one man be allowed to own so many firearms legally? What possible use could he legitimately have?

These are questions that point to the rest of the world’s incredulity about the US’s famously lax gun laws.

Gun control is a vital issue the world over, after all, guns are weapons that kill – depending on where the person pulling the trigger actually aims.

Here at home, our problem is not with the control of legally owned weapons, but rather with the sea of stolen weapons that are used in just about every violent crime. Indeed, our criminals are so brazen they steal confiscated firearms from police stations or hold up soldiers and law enforcement officers to steal their weapons – then use those same firearms to commit crimes.

Is the answer not to clamp down on firearms altogether and introduce zero tolerance for gun crimes?

There are many countries which have successfully managed to navigate between an individual’s right to own a firearm and a state’s duty to protect its citizens from gun crimes.

Britain is a perfect example, as are the Scandinavian countries and many other parts of Europe.

Gun enthusiasts here at home will scream civil liberties, much as their American counterparts will, but surely one part of the solution has to be to reduce the number of firearms in this country – whether legal or illegal?