Clubs and the Clubs SI

rrpc

I meant to do this a while ago, but got tied up elsewhere.

This part of the legislation is like twins seperated at birth. The clubs SI has a brother called the ranges SI and that's still a little way away from being enacted. There is a draft which was outlined at the FCP ranges conference and can be downloaded from the NTSA and NASRPC websites.

Therefore you can have a club which is seperate from a range or a range that isn't a club.

All clubs should be authorised now using the FRPC1 form. Temporary membership of clubs is not allowed, but ranges would allow for a certain number of 'open' days - fifteen being the amount mentioned in the draft.

All ranges must be certified by the range inspector.

Ranges can have 'attached' clubs, or members of other clubs can shoot at ranges by agreement with the range operator.

All of the above details must be recorded by the range operator.

Basically, the system means that 'pay for play' is no longer allowed with regard to rifle and pistol ranges. If you want to shoot, you must be a member of a club or a range, or attend a range at one of its designated open days.

Bananaman

The Open days thing I just don't get.

Many of the Ranges/Clubs (I know, I know they will be seperated) offer Clay Pigeon, Benchrest .22 Rifle or Archery practice to non members - mine does.

Pistol shooting was never available to the great unwashed anyway.

What this 'Open Day' thing in essence does is to prevent them from offering rifle shooting to non members seeing as Clay Pigoen Shooting is exempt from everything and archery does not come under any of this.

Does anyone understand the point of this?
Why is it there?
What brought this up?
What was discussed at FCP about it?

B'Man

rrpc

There was certainly a fear that centre fire pistol would be offered in 'pay for play' scenarios and that's why section 2(6) of the firearms act was amended as well.

It may not have been offered to people, but there was nothing stopping it happening either, and the press reports of 'gangsters' going to the Czech Republic to hone their 'skills' possibly focussed people's thoughts on the same thing happening here.

Sparks

It's a shame that creative pricing dances rings around the "pay for play" ban...

rrpc

Sparks wrote: »

It's a shame that creative pricing dances rings around the "pay for play" ban...

Well it doesn't really. The point being that once you've joined a club for whatever peppercorn fee that's charged, you're now 'in the system' and all your data must be recorded by the club for inspection by the Gardai.

This was never about stopping people 'having a go', just about the wrong kind of people 'having a go'.

Sam I Am

From my reading of the draft for Ranges. A Range must have at least 10 members.
Maybe I picked that up wrong, but that seemed strange to me.

Also, if you are a member of a Club, do you have to be a paid up member of a Range also, to have somewhere to shoot?

Sorry just re-read OP... attached Clubs and arrangement...

rrpc

Sam I Am wrote: »

From my reading of the draft for Ranges. A Range must have at least 10 members.
Maybe I picked that up wrong, but that seemed strange to me.

Also, if you are a member of a Club, do you have to be a paid up member of a Range also, to have somewhere to shoot?

Sorry just re-read OP... attached Clubs and arrangement...

Ok, so I was clear enough

Sparks

rrpc wrote: »

Well it doesn't really. The point being that once you've joined a club for whatever peppercorn fee that's charged, you're now 'in the system' and all your data must be recorded by the club for inspection by the Gardai.
This was never about stopping people 'having a go', just about the wrong kind of people 'having a go'.

Yes... but now all that's happened is that the undesirable element 'having a go' have to fool a club secretary instead of a Garda, and the club has taken on an undefined liability in the event of something going sideways. It's like the Children in Sport legislation all over again - instead of it being the State's job to spot miscreants, liability for spotting people (whose ability it not be spotted is legendary) has been passed squarely over to the clubs.

Don't get me wrong, I understand the intent and even agree with it to a large extent - but I think we've gone too far past the midpoint of the pendulum swing here, if you know what I mean.

rrpc

Sparks wrote: »

Yes... but now all that's happened is that the undesirable element 'having a go' have to fool a club secretary instead of a Garda, and the club has taken on an undefined liability in the event of something going sideways. It's like the Children in Sport legislation all over again - instead of it being the State's job to spot miscreants, liability for spotting people (whose ability it not be spotted is legendary) has been passed squarely over to the clubs.

I can't see how the clubs and ranges legislation has created an 'instead of' situation with regard to the Gardai. If 'pay for play' was still allowed, the clubs would still have a role in recording and noting visitors and making value judgments as to whether to allow people 'play' or not.

There's not much difference in this case except that it's now a requirement in law that details are recorded. Before that it was the Super who decided (in his authorisation) what stuff got recorded and reported.

Sparks

It's now a requirement in law that details be recorded; but consider for a moment the case where an "undesireable element" walks in, provides fraudulent data to the secretary, who then passes that on to the Gardai who detect that it's fraudulent.

At that point, what are the legal implications for the secretary? Are they liable for not detecting the fraud? What degree of due diligence is required on their part before granting access to the range to the person in question? It's not possible for the Super to determine that on the fly like it was before.

Are we now supposed to run or request background checks on everyone who walks in the door, the way we're meant to do for coaches that work with children? I mean, archery just spent a year tearing itself up over the introduction of that policy for all its members, and it's led to a situation where several clubs have created an alternative to the NGB so people who just want to twang can do so without needing to go through garda background checks (while those who want to compete nationally or coach kids go through the full rigmarole). You can see the downside of such a situation!

rrpc

Sparks wrote: »

It's now a requirement in law that details be recorded; but consider for a moment the case where an "undesireable element" walks in, provides fraudulent data to the secretary, who then passes that on to the Gardai who detect that it's fraudulent.

At that point, what are the legal implications for the secretary? Are they liable for not detecting the fraud? What degree of due diligence is required on their part before granting access to the range to the person in question? It's not possible for the Super to determine that on the fly like it was before.

A club nominated person is not going to have the resources to carry out background checks or investigate each putative member of the club. However, they can ask the Gardai to check into someone's bona fides if they want and I know this has been done in the past. Most of the time it won't be necessary, because of the close nature of our sport, but from time to time, I'd believe that yes it's necessary and prudent to ask the Gardai about member applicants.

You need to have a look at the application forms for the UK and NI clubs to see that this stuff is now part of the landsacape.

Sparks

I've seen it in the UK clubs rrpc, but you and I both know that the UK clubs are complaining that they're in effect being grandfathered out by all the red tape - the average age for UK shooters is rising, despite their junior programmes, and we've had the same problem here for a while even without these new requirements.

And I'm not overjoyed at the thought of asking every member to be subjected to Garda background checks, because that's what we're talking about here - WTSC's had a half-dozen requests to join beginner courses in the last fortnight alone from people none of us have ever heard from, let alone vetted by knowing them for a while. And even those you'd know, well, you know them in the sense that you see them in the club for six hours or so before they join up; for college clubs, you might get six minutes. And the fun for college clubs is monumental, what with signing up 400 members in a single week. Are they to be vetted?

None of this is giving me the warm fuzzies...

rrpc

Sparks wrote: »

I've seen it in the UK clubs rrpc, but you and I both know that the UK clubs are complaining that they're in effect being grandfathered out by all the red tape - the average age for UK shooters is rising, despite their junior programmes, and we've had the same problem here for a while even without these new requirements.

And I'm not overjoyed at the thought of asking every member to be subjected to Garda background checks, because that's what we're talking about here - WTSC's had a half-dozen requests to join beginner courses in the last fortnight alone from people none of us have ever heard from, let alone vetted by knowing them for a while. And even those you'd know, well, you know them in the sense that you see them in the club for six hours or so before they join up; for college clubs, you might get six minutes. And the fun for college clubs is monumental, what with signing up 400 members in a single week. Are they to be vetted?

None of this is giving me the warm fuzzies...

I didn't say it would have to be done all the time and I don't think it will be necessary for the college clubs as they don't really interface with the licensing system all that much. Where they do, then it might be necessary, but by that time, the people concerned will have a very long track record. Colleges are a closed shop in any event as there's an overarching membership requirement that not every Tom, Dick and Heavy can meet.

We can complain all we like, but this stuff was on the cards since 2004 and we've had five years to get ready for it.

Sparks

rrpc wrote: »

We can complain all we like, but this stuff was on the cards since 2004 and we've had five years to get ready for it.

In fairness, it was noted in 2004 as being a problem...

Sparks wrote: »

Oh boy. The legislation for the authorisation of ranges looks positively scary

In more detail:
http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=50424918&postcount=137

rrpc

Sparks wrote: »

In fairness, it was noted in 2004 as being a problem...:D

In more detail:
http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=50424918&postcount=137

Never meant to imply that you didn't know it was on the cards

Sparks

But, to be fair, the fine detail of all this hasn't been so obvious for quite so long. And up until fairly recently, it might have gone down a path that wasn't quite so legally scary for club secretaries. And if we nail down what the problems are here and now, we can at least work to fix or mitigate them.