Sharpshooter

As far as licensing goes, Lincolnshire has “done a Catalonia”, but is it time to have a single group of specialists to assess medical records?

My eldest son contacted me about his coterminous certificate renewal. He had been outraged to be told that the police wouldn’t process his application until they had a medical clearance from his GP. He doesn’t even have a GP. I gave him the glad tidings that, because he now lives in Edinburgh, he had to comply. In England and Wales, the default position is that if your GP doesn’t respond to the initial query within 21 days, the police go ahead and process your application. In Scotland, however, they do things differently.

Much as I love Scotland, I am so glad I don’t live under a bossy regime typified by spiteful land reform and airgun licensing. But how many different licensing systems are being operated in Great Britain? It seems we have distinct systems for Scotland, England and Wales, Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, the Channel Islands…

Oh, and then there is Lincolnshire, which seems to have done a Catalonia (News, 1 November). With blatant disregard for the Home Office guidelines and the agreement worked out with the British Medical Association (BMA), local doctors and Lincolnshire Police have allegedly cooked up a scheme to force applicants to pay GPS to respond to the initial medical query. If a GP reports some sort of relevant health issue, the police may ask for a medical report specific to this condition and you may have to stump up for this report. Unfortunately, there are always those who will exploit confusion and complexity.

Doesn’t the BMA’S remit extend to Lincolnshire? It turns out that the BMA is little more than a trade union. It cannot tell GPS what to do; it doesn’t represent all GPS, anyway. Getting GPS to agree on anything is like herding cats.

You may think that GPS work for us, the public, via the NHS. But in truth they work for themselves. Each practice is a separate private enterprise, which has a contract to deliver GP services for the NHS. And this contract does not include scanning our medical records in order to respond to initial police enquiries about our suitability to hold firearms. Yes, GPS were trained at public expense. Yes, they have a captive market. And yes, we might expect them to feel some obligation to public safety.

But the sad fact is that many GPS feel besieged by overwork and bureaucracy. They are less than enthusiastic about taking on an additional, non-contractual burden. The situation is not helped by worries that they may be held liable if an applicant they initially clear later turns out to be unsuitable.

It is not as if they get much thanks for performing this extra task, either. Some applicants take to social media to complain about being charged by their GP for “writing a letter”. In fact, the process involves reading and assessing your medical records. How much would, say, a lawyer charge for an equivalent task?

Given that most of us don’t even have “our” GP any more but see whoever is available, why can’t the initial medical screening system be centralised? Surely it would be better to have a single group of specialists assessing medical records, with strict performance guarantees and deadlines, in return for a standardised fee? I have floated this idea before — has Lincolnshire now triggered an opportunity to take it seriously?

“The BMA cannot tell GPS what to do. Getting GPS to agree on anything is like herding cats”