New arms declaration system, Thierry Coste explains everything to you!The weekly Chassons.com newsletter

By fashionlifeshopping 16/08/2022 854 Views

From next year, French hunters will continue to register their rifles and shotguns (except those purchased before 2011) in a new, more efficient and computerized file. This will be the SIA, the new Information System for Weapons. Individuals will have a virtual rack which will allow them in particular to avoid traveling to the prefecture to declare weapons but also to edit their European firearms card online. Gunsmiths, for their part, will now use a completely dematerialized register. Since the announcement of this new reform, some hunters and professionals have expressed their fears. Will the file perform? Are we going to have to declare all our weapons? How to declare an old rifle from the 1980s that belonged to his grandfather? And the interest of hunters in all this, of “policing”, a control reserved for “bad” hunters?

To understand a little better the concrete implementation of this new system, we interviewed Thierry Coste, secretary general of the Guillaume Tell Committee, and political adviser to the FNC.

Chassons.com: Why did the Ministry of the Interior want to set up a new firearms registration system?Thierry Coste: As you know, since November 16, 2007, a computerized file of owners and possessors of 'weapons had been formalized within the Ministry of the Interior, the Agrippa file. All players in the firearms market had a shared knowledge of the obsolete nature of this system. As there was no precise referencing of weapons, we ended up with prefectures, gunsmiths and hunters who sometimes put numbers that did not correspond to anything. Today this file is no longer usable. We were therefore in a catastrophic situation. The government having adapted an online registration system for registration documents and vehicle registration, the authorities have decided to take advantage of this to also develop and in the same spirit the online registration of weapons present on the territory, by favoring registration by a professional, namely the gunsmith. The Guillaume Tell Committee and the National Federation of Hunters have obviously largely supported this simplification process.

Chassons.com: Yes, but what do you say to those who believe that they will be even more “policed”?Thierry Coste: Perhaps they should first stop using their cellphones or bank cards? .The policing has become permanent and we are talking about possession of firearms. So you have to be reasonable, accept controls and not be too paranoid while remaining vigilant. This is a very good approach and it could only be done by computer. We had to obtain a simple referencing to allow hunters to facilitate their steps in the integration of weapon classifications. French hunters practice diversified hunting methods requiring the use of several weapons.

Chassons.com: But won't this approach disrupt the hunting ecosystem? Thierry Coste: There are changes that are very useful, but we are aware that nothing is ever easy, especially from a computing point of view. We have seen it with ChassAdapt (system allowing the declaration of samples), hunters are obliged to use the application on their smartphone and some are not very familiar with the technique. In addition, we pleaded to eliminate as much paper as possible. In this system, you will find a product sheet repository for those who will need to register their weapon, the objective is to make life easier for hunters and gunsmiths and by extension the administration.

New weapons declaration system, Thierry Coste explains everything to you! THE WEEKLY NEWSLETTER OF CHASSONS.COM

Chassons.com: So you can confirm that from next year hunters will have control over their virtual rack? the gunsmiths were heavily blocked. We are therefore still in discussion on the deadline for the application of the service. Gunsmiths will have to be given time to integrate all the weapons they have in stock into this software. But I repeat, this system will facilitate the traceability of weapons and their owners. So there's nothing innocent about it.

Chassons.com: If I decide to buy a new weapon next year from my gunsmith, how will this system change his daily life?Thierry Coste: If you buy a weapon from a gunsmith, the latter will do everything for you and, with this portal, registration will be simplified. Already today, the gunsmith is obliged to check the file of prohibited weapons, (FINIADA). With the new portal, everyone will save time. Obviously, there will be a little set up and a little time to adapt. We will ensure that aids are available online to facilitate the task of professionals.

Chassons.com: And the hunters, will they be helped? Thierry Coste: Yes indeed, the FNC and the Guillaume Tell Committee are working on the production of very detailed instructions for the opening of the hunt for federations and hunters.

Chassons.com: But then, will hunters have to declare all the weapons they have at home, even grandfather's old rifle? Thierry Coste: We know that some people have weapons from their family and it is possible that some documents may have been lost during successions and moves. We therefore made a request to the Ministry of the Interior to allow hunters to declare weapons without origin over a period of one to two years. It should be remembered that in the past when you changed department, you were not sure that the prefecture had indeed transferred the information. However, since then, some individuals do not know how to “be in good standing” and they are worried. The goal is to help them. If you have recovered a 22 Long Rifle rifle from your grandfather without documents, you must be able to take advantage of this period to simply declare it. Obviously, the process of wanting to be in good standing and declaring all your weapons is virtuous, so you have to encourage it and not bore these honest hunters. We are talking about rifles and shotguns, not Kalashnikovs, the administration must be reasonable. Nevertheless, I remind you to be clear that hunting rifles purchased before 2011 are not to be declared, unless they are the subject of a sale. All the feed must be recorded and it is legitimate in terms of public safety.

Chassons.com: What do you say to gunsmiths who are afraid of the implementation of this new file and who are afraid of being very busy next year?

Thierry Coste: We are going to carry out in-depth work with the Chambre Syndicale des Armuriers chaired by Yves Gollety and FEPAM so that we can assist everyone. Gunsmiths will also undoubtedly benefit from more visits from their customers, which, a priori, is rather good for the profession. And in certain transactions, face to face or with an approved broker When you go through the Internet for the sale between individuals. , the gunsmith may charge a modest legitimate service fee to do the registration work. . When the weapon repository is very good, all of this will take much less time.

Chassons.com: Some hunters are afraid of the future and think that the next step will be to limit their number of weapons in the more or less near future?

Thierry Coste: You know, there are always good souls in the administration or in Parliament who dream of reducing the number of weapons because they do not understand that we can have different weapons according to our hunting methods. Moreover, we must also stop the paranoia on the side of our anti-weapons opponents because most of us have a reduced number of weapons for hunting small and large game. You should still know that France probably has the most comprehensive and strictest regulations in Europe. We are the European country that accepts the most checks with the weapon ban file, hunting license validations and this new portal. We play transparency and are under “total control”. This is also the reason why we also want, within this strict framework, to be left alone with simple and pragmatic procedures for the 2 million legal users of firearms. The William Tell Committee is not the NRA and never will be. We do not plead for the liberalization of arms, nor for the carrying of arms as certain associative small groups may demand. Thanks to this new file, we have full traceability. In France, if an individual is prohibited from carrying a weapon, he cannot in any case obtain a hunting permit, a validation, a shooting license and even less buy weapons or ammunition. On the other hand, it must be recognized that in the past 20 years, the date of the creation of the Guillaume Tell Committee, we have always been consulted very early on by the Ministers of the Interior and by parliamentarians. It is the European directives that sometimes hurt us and impose unnecessary additional constraints on us. We mobilize each time to lobby but we do not always win everything in negotiations with 27 Member States.

Chassons.com: Olivier, one of our Internet users, has a semi-auto that dates from 2005 and has already been declared to the prefecture, will his file automatically follow on his virtual rack? In short, will the paper declarations of hunters be automatically transferred to the portal?

Thierry Coste: The Ministry of the Interior promised us that there would be no new declarations to produce, it is up to the State to do this work. Obviously, we will be vigilant when the portal is going to start… We don't want the hunters to have to redo everything they have already done scrupulously.

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