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Journalism of Courage
In 1996, 16 children and their teacher were brutally killed in a shooting at a primary school in the Scottish town of Dunblane. The incident, widely recognised as one of the worst instances of gun-related violence in Britain’s history, sparked unprecedented outrage and ultimately prompted a near-total ban on the private ownership of handguns in the country.
Soon after the massacre, bereaved relatives of the victims as well as other residents of Dunblane launched a public campaign against gun ownership. They were able to present a petition with over 7,50,000 signatures before the UK government.
Years later, following a school shooting in Parkland, Florida in 2018, some of the Dunblane residents wrote to the survivors of the incident, urging them to stand up to the gun lobby and pressure Congress to pass stricter gun laws in the United States, Buzzfeed UK reported. However, over two decades later, gun legislation remains stalled in Congress.
On Wednesday, at least 19 children and two adults were killed after an 18-year-old gunman opened fire at an elementary school in Texas.
On March 13, 1996, a 43-year-old former Scout leader named Thomas Hamilton opened fire in the gymnasium of a primary school in Dunblane. Within minutes, 15 children between the ages of five and six, and their teacher Gwen Mayor, were killed. Two other teachers were severely injured while trying to shield the children from the gunman. Hamilton later shot himself and was found dead at the scene.
Incidentally, tennis star Andy Murray was among the children present at the primary school during the massacre, CNN reported. The tennis player, who was eight years old at the time, was walking towards the gymnasium moments before Hamilton opened fire, he wrote in his autobiography Hitting Back.
Soon after the massacre, relatives of the victims as well as residents of Dunblane launched a massive campaign for gun reform. While this wasn’t the first instance of gun violence in the country, the fact that the victims of the attack were mainly young children meant the UK parliament had little choice but to take notice.
In the months that followed, then prime minister John Major announced that he was setting up a judicial inquiry to look into the country’s gun laws.
Britain’s first mass shooting took place in a small town in Berkshire in 1987. In the wake of the attack, in which 16 people were killed, the British government introduced the Firearms (Amendment) Act, 1988, which made it mandatory to register shotguns and banned all semi-automatic and pump-action weapons.
But for the most part, the gun lobby was able to evade demands for tighter gun control. This was also partly because the Firearms Consultative Committee, set up at the time to advise the government, was full of gun lobby representatives.
What steps did the British government take following the Dunblane incident?
A grassroots campaign called ‘Snowdrop’ pushed MPs to reject the proposals put forth following the judicial inquiry. Within a year and a half of the incident, the British parliament voted for a ban on handguns exceeding .22 calibre.
Thousands of firearms and rounds of ammunition were also surrendered in firearm amnesties following the incident.
While Britain does not have a widespread “gun culture” like in the US, there were about 2 lakh legally-registered handguns in the country at the time, according to a CNN report. Most were owned by sports shooters.
While the ban had little impact in initial years, statistics show the number of crimes involving guns in England and Wales began to drop from 2000 onward, CNN reported.
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