Criminal Justice Act 1967

85 Prohibition on possessing or acquiring a shot gun without a certificate.

(1) Subject to any exemption having effect by virtue of this section any person who has in his possession or purchases or acquires a shot gun without holding a certificate authorising him to possess shot guns shall be guilty of an offence.

(2) Any such certificate (hereafter in this Part of this Act referred to as a shot gun certificate) shall be granted by the chief officer of police unless he has reason to believe that the applicant—

(a) is prohibited by the [1937 c. 12.] Firearms Act 1937 from possessing a shot gun ; or

(b) cannot be permitted to possess a shot gun without danger to the public safety or to the peace;

and a shot gun certificate may be revoked by the chief officer of police for the area in which the holder resides if the officer is satisfied that the holder is so prohibited or cannot be permitted to possess a shot gun as aforesaid.

(3) A shot gun certificate shall—

(a) be in the prescribed form ;

(b) be granted or renewed subject to any prescribed conditions and no others ; and

(c) specify the conditions, if any, subject to which it is granted or renewed.

(4) Any person who fails to comply with any condition subject to which a shot gun certificate is held by him shall be guilty of an offence.

(5) A person guilty of an offence under this section shall be liable on summary conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months or a fine not exceeding £200 or both.

(6) In Scotland, a contravention of this section which, if it had been triable on indictment, could competently have been libelled as an additional or alternative charge in an indictment charging a person with an offence involving any injury or attempted injury of, or any threat or intent to injure, any person or property by the use or attempted use of a firearm, may, notwithstanding anything in this section, be so libelled and tried.

(7) The following provisions of the Firearms Act 1937, that is to say, sections 2(1), (4) and (8) to (10), 3(1), 4, 5, 6, 11(1), (3) and (4), 14, 15, 25 and Schedule 2 (provisions relating to firearms to which Part I of that Act applies, that is to say firearms other than shot guns and air weapons) shall apply in relation to shot guns and shot gun certificates as they apply in relation to firearms to which the said Part I applies and firearm certificates, but shall so apply subject to the following modifications and exceptions:—

(a) the reference in section 2(4) of that Act to the foregoing provisions of that section shall be construed as including a reference to subsection (2) of this section;

(b) the following paragraph shall be added at the end of section 11(1) of that Act (prohibition on transferring firearm to person not producing certificate):—

“(c) a person returning to another a shot gun which he has lawfully undertaken to repair, test or prove for the other.”

(8) Any person who has been in Great Britain for not more than thirty days in all in the preceding twelve months may have in his possession, or purchase or acquire, a shot gun without holding a shot gun certificate.

(9) A person may without holding a shot gun certificate use a shot gun at a time and place approved for shooting at artificial targets by the chief officer of police for the area in which that place is situated.

(10) A person may without holding a shot gun certificate borrow a shot gun from the occupier of private premises and use the shot gun on those premises in the presence of the occupier.

(11) Subsection (1) of this section shall not apply to a person holding a firearm certificate issued in Northern Ireland authorising him to possess a shot gun.

(12) Without prejudice to section 30(d) of the [1937 c. 12.] Firearms Act 1937 (rules for delegating the functions of a chief officer of police in specified circumstances) the functions of a chief officer of police under that Act, the [1965 c. 44.] Firearms Act 1965 or this Part of this Act shall be exercisable on any occasion by a person, or a person of any particular class, authorised by the chief officer of police to exercise that function on that occasion or on occasions of that class or on all occasions.

(13) Notwithstanding anything in section 2(4) of the Firearms Act 1937 (duration of firearms certificate), a shot-gun certificate issued before the expiration of six months from the date of the commencement of this Act shall continue in force for such period from that date or from the date when it is granted, whichever is the later, as may be specified in the certificate by the chief officer of police (being a period of not less than one year but not more than five years).