Gun owner and hunter groups in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland have linked up to “share expertise and experience on firearms-related issues”.
The move has been described as “ground-breaking” by the Firearms Users Representative Group (FURG), which is an umbrella group of gun owner, hunting, and shooting groups here.
FURG recently met with its northern counterpart, the Northern Ireland Firearms Representative Group (NIFRG), during which both organisations “committed to an ongoing process of cooperation and engagement”.
The two organisations have agreed to meet face-to-face annually, and hold online meetings at least twice a year, or more frequently if issues arise that require “a coordinated response”.
FURG consists of 15 individual organisations, and was formed in July 2022 to coordinate the gun owner and shooting community’s response to proposals coming from the government’s Firearms Expert Committee (FEC).
The FEC published two reports last year which included recommendations on changing the firearm licencing regime in Ireland.
At the time, FURG described these recommendations as “impractical, unworkable, unnecessary, unenforceable, unduly restrictive on sporting shooters under every discipline, and adding little or nothing to public safety or security”.
FURG also described the proposals as “draconian”.
FURG is chaired by representatives from the National Association of Regional Game Councils (NARGC), while FURG’s secretariat is provided by the Deer Alliance (DA).
The Irish Natura and Hill Farmers’ Association (INHFA) is also a member group of FURG.
The NIFRG, meanwhile, was formed in May 2021, and has 10 member groups. It is chaired by the British Association for Shooting and Conservation (BASC), with its secretariat provided by Country Sports Ireland (CSI).
Certain groups operate on an all-island basis and are therefore members of both FURG and NIFRG, so that the total number of groups represented is 23 across both umbrella organisations.
Commenting after the meeting, a spokesperson for FURG said: “We welcome the opportunity to host the NIFRG and we regard this meeting as a major first step in developing a strong mutually beneficial partnership, that will allow us to harness the power of our collective membership bases, to robustly meet the many challenges that lie ahead in both jurisdictions.”
A spokesperson for the NIFRG said: “We have witnessed first-hand the benefits of multiple organisations coming and working closely together under the NIFRG umbrella, to help drive policy change sand successfully oppose unnecessary restrictions that were not evidence based.”