Rise in street gun numbers

THE number of guns on our streets has hit its highest level in eight years.

Experts blame licensed firearms being stolen by gangs and weapons smuggled from abroad.

The National Ballistics Intelligence Service had a record 1,300 firearms sent in for testing in 2010-11.

Paul Gibbins, head of the Met’s specialist firearms forensics lab, said: “We deemed pre-2012 as the peak. We were drowning in guns at the lab and are over that [level] now.”