Introduction
This piece explores the troubling inconsistencies and lack of transparency in firearms licensing statistics across England and Wales.
Drawing on recent data releases, I highlight how misleading figures can obscure operational realities.
This article considers 3 key Data Sources:
- National Police Chief’s Council
- BASC Annual report (Police figures within)
- Home Office Firearms Licensing Statistics
National Police Chiefs Council
Firearms Licensing 2024/25 Quarter 4 Headlines (1 January 2025 to 31 March 2025)
This data can be found via this link:
Unfortunately, this actually gives us very little useful information, particularly as it is issued with no explanatory notes as to how the figures are calculated. As a result, there are more questions than answers.
If we take a closer look at the first few Forces.
Avon and Somerset –
The first 3 columns make sense. There’s a five year cycle of renewals so we might expect 4,500 ish renewal applications to be submitted in a year and the rest could be mostly made up of grants and variations.
At first glance I might be impressed that 93% of applications were completed within 4 months, as indicated in Column 5. However, if I take the numbers from columns 3 and 4 my sums look like this:
3483 / 5336 = 0.65 which translates to 65%.
So, something else must be going on here. It’s very natural to read columns of numbers and assume that they relate to each other, but it doesn’t look like this is the case here.
Perhaps the numbers mean that of the 5,336 applications received in the last 12 months 3,482 have been completed within 4 months of receipt and that this represents 93% of all applications received during the 3 month period that this information covers. In all honesty it’s impossible to say for certain.
I have sent an email (30Jul’25) requesting some further explanation from the National Police Chief’s Council. This email has been acknowledged but no details has been provided yet.
Bedfordshire –
Moving these issues to one side the next Force up is Bedfordshire who according to this data have completed 140 applications within 4 months which is a reported 39% of the total.
Bedfordshire is part of a Tri-Force Alliance with Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire, so direct comparisons are perhaps unfair but gives strong indication that the excessive delays in this Force are unlikely to be resolved soon.
BASC – Performance Report
The Performance of Police Firearms Licensing Departments in England and Wales 2025
This document can be found via this link – https://basc.org.uk/basc-publishes-most-comprehensive-firearms-licensing-report-to-date/
In this report BASC have completed the most complete report on Firearms Licensing to date, which is summarised on page 4 of the document.
To be very clear – The following observations are not intended as a criticism of BASC. The data in question has been provided by police from the National Firearms Licensing Management System (NFLMS).
Each police force receives an individual section which includes other data obtained from the police via Freedom of Information Act (FOI) requests. This police data is shown below:
On the police data I have highlighted two key figures.
- Applications Completed (Received within last 12 months) – 50%
- Received in last 12 months / Completed in 4 months – 82%
The figures appear contradictory. If 50% of applications are completed overall, how can 82% be completed within four months? Without explanatory notes, these statistics risk misleading stakeholders.
I have sent an email (30Jul’25) requesting some further explanation from the National Police Chief’s Council. This email has been acknowledged but no details has been provided yet.
Home Office Statistics
The official Home Office Statistics are released on an annual basis, compiled by a named Statistician and comply with guidelines set down by the Office for Statistics Regulation.
They can be found via this link:
Within the summary text this report states:
“482,612 shotgun certificates on issue as at 31 March 2025, a 3% decrease (-13,186) compared with 31 March 2024 (495,798). This is the sixth consecutive year there has been a decrease and marks the lowest number of shotgun certificates on issue since comparable records began.”
“334 new applications for firearm certificates were refused (5%), a 19% decrease compared with the previous year (414) but the second highest number since comparable records began, following the introduction of the NFLMS in 2007”
“1,073 new applications for shotgun certificates were refused (7%), a similar number to the previous year (1,072) and the highest since comparable records began, following the introduction of the NFLMS in 2007”
Within this document you can find data tables which give specific detail on key information on firearms licensing broken down into individual Forces.
It is within this document that you can compare Forces and identify the serious differences within them.
For example:
During the course of 12 months – South Yorkshire consider 378 grant applications for shotgun certificates and refuse 77 of these.
During the same time period – North Yorkshire consider 550 grant applications for shotgun certificates and refuse only 9 of these.
These figures indicate that living South of the M62 makes you 12.5 times more likely to be refused than if you live on the North of it!
(Note – The Border between Forces isn’t that simple but illustrates the point)
In Conclusion:
The current presentation of firearms licensing statistics reveals a troubling lack of clarity, consistency, and methodological transparency from the police. These figures are not just confusing; they risk misleading stakeholders and undermining public trust.
Under the UK Statistics Authority’s Code of Practice for Statistics, official data must uphold the principles of trustworthiness, quality, and value. That means clear definitions, robust methods, and relevance to users.
Firearms licensing affects public safety, individual rights, and operational accountability. If we are to govern it fairly, the data must meet the same standards of integrity we expect from the system itself.
Transparency is not a luxury. It’s a duty.
