The attitude of the Irish Government is again knee jerk from the limited information that they are releasing the main point of this legislation is to restrict the licensing of hand guns but they are bundling in swords as well which is ridiculous.
I'll handle the gun issue first, the government (Noel Ahern) seems to think that we are developing a gun culture which again is unfounded as it is the criminal element of Ireland that seem to be obsessed with hand guns not your average Joe soap who has to go through a lot of red tape in order to own one, for sport mainly Olympic pistol shooting, and I believe that this will pretty much kill of any chances of us getting a medal there.
Looking at it from the governments perspective I assume that the fear that some of these pistols will fall into the hands of criminal gangs, having there serial number filed off and end up being used in crimes, but there is a simple solution to this if they test fire each pistol they will have a copy of the striation marks eliminating the serial number problem, but as i said i think this is a knee jerk reaction so they haven’t thought of that.
If the Olympic council of Ireland is contacted they may lend there support which will put a bit more weight and numbers behind the argument.
Now the main topic Swords I've done some research on sword crimes and found two cases.
One where some guy walked into a pub and chopped off another guys hand in front of a lot of people and clearly wasn't a martial artist and seems to be a one off incident, Ill get back to what may have prevented this later and what i believe is the real solution to the issue.
The second case is a young father (26) who states that there where a group of young lads causing damage to his car on several occasions, and one particular incident he in his own words approached the lads disarmed one that was carrying a sword and gave chase through a local field, one of the neighbours reported it and the gards perused with the help of the garda helicopter the young father was arrested and charged.
While in court the young Father said he had disarmed one of the lads and received a wound to his hand consistent with such an event and produced a receipt for previous damage to his car which was disregarded because he had not reported the previous incidents to the gards and received a pretty severe sentence if I recall correctly 6 years.
I recognise the dangers of these incidents and don't want to make light of them but compared to crimes committed with knifes these crimes would be far less than 1%,and I don’t�e the Government trying to ban knives, I know that suggestion of banning knifes is laughable to a responsible person who has knifes in their kitchen, but so is banning swords to responsible sword owner, and this is the point that the Government is missing, and if this legislation is Passed it looks like sword owners will become criminals overnight.
At this stage I would like to make some points anyone who practices martial arts tends to follow the Budo code in one form or another which, is peaceful stressing the power or the pen or in this case keypad, and private collectors will have some understanding of this code, and use their swords as display only.
So with this in mind i would like to put forward what i believe would be one practical solution to the issue.
The National Sword Database
* A privately held list of all sword owners in the country with one central import zone, With the following rules and categories and supports.
Categories
*Sword owners involved in martial arts sharp.
*Sword owners involved in martial arts blunt.
*Junior Sword owners involved in martial arts sharp.
*Junior Sword owners involved in martial arts Blunt.
*Private Sword Collectors.
Rules
*All sword owners (sharp) must be 18 Years of age (with the exception of 16 year olds that have reached black belt level in any existing sword art with the permission of their Sensei of Master and existing junior sword owners)
*All existing swords and new imports should be photographed and recorded including type of metal, sword smiths signature, manufactures name, owners name, address and telephone number whether blunt or sharp.
*Modifications and repairs should be reported to the database where new photos and a new registration will take place.
* One central import area for all new swords entering Ireland where they will be recorded.
*Access to the data base will only be voluntarily released to the authorities in relation to a crime with permission of the sword owner, where a sword has been used as a weapon and has been identified as having specific marks to a sword on the database.
*Where a sword crime has occurred in the area of a registered sword owner or owners you will be informed and asked if necessary to voluntarily present your sword to the relevent authorities for inspection so that you can be ruled out of any investigation.
* Where a sword has been damaged beyond repair it shall be regarded as such presented to the database head office, checked, decommissioned and sent for recycling, and the owner will be issued with a cert of decommissioning and recycling.
Supports
*News letter when new legeslation is proposed.
*Access to legal support.
*Support when ordering swords or problems relating to consumer rights.
*Decommissioning and Recycling.
*A political voice in support of responsible Sword ownership.
I'm asking all sword owners for there support and suggestions on this issues and i believe that if we all come together on this, that we have a good chance of at least becoming involved in the debate and having some influence on the legislation.
If the Governments issues are addressed before the legislation reaches the dail it will be much easer to prevent responsible sword owners becoming overnight criminals.
Anyone interested in putting together a demonstration for Noel Ahern and an introduction to Budo Arts please let me know, as education is the answer to ignorance.
Please lend me your support on the boards or email me at
nationalsworddatabase@gmail.com If you would like to register a sword email me, and I promise to keep administrative costs to a minimum.