60 replies to this topic

[wayne]

Hi All,

 

I've been asked by the Home Office to respond to a consultation document on the amendments to current regulations around explosive precursors.  This could have an effect on our experimental activities in the respect of the procurement of chemicals.  I've not had chance to read the document myself yet, but I would be interested to hear any of your views.

 

Please don't respond directly to the Home Office (unless you have you're own personal or business related issues), instead pass me your views and I will consolidate these into one response representing the Society.

 

I must stress that the Home Office requested our feedback to ensure that the changes make as little impact on us as possible.  Again, this is another great example how how well we are respected!

 

You can download the documents here:

 

https://www.gov.uk/g...s-consultations

 

You can email me direct if you wish on: wayne@ignitepyro.com or discuss in this thread.

 

Cheers,

Wayne.

Edited by wayne, 03 December 2013 - 05:40 PM.

[dave]

quote.."

I must stress that the Home Office requested our feedback to ensure that the changes make as little impact on us as possible.  Again, this is another great example how how well we are respected!"

 

i have not had chance to read the full document yet, just a quick scan, but i really dont see how those proposals help the situation to have "as little impact on us as possible"

 

surely the sole purpose of this is to make the activity more restrictive

 

symptomatic of the times unfortunately,...............bound to get worse

 

please tell me i'm wrong.

 

think i'll start stamp collecting, may even take up playing tiddlywinks

[phildunford]

Need to read more, but here are gut reactions.

 

The purpose of such legislation is to stop the bad guys getting hold of things. We all know that they will get hold of whatever they want, irrespective of legislation and that it is only us (the good guys) that will be inconvenienced. From this perspective, option 1 (do nothing) is best. I suspect HSE have no intention of following option 1.

 

Many of the chems will affect us, Pot Chlor, Pot Perchlor, Barium Carbonate, Barium Nitrate for starters. Also the conc acids, Pot & sodium hydroxide spring to mind for other hobby activities. So both explosive precursers and poisons affect us.

 

The concentrations expressed as %W/W means they are talking about solutions, and as we generally use solids (effectively 100%) all restrictions would seem to apply. Low concentration solutions would be of no use to us.

 

A worrying sign is that any licence would have to 'pay for itself' meaning that if only a few took it up, it could be very expensive. How would one prove entitlement to such a licence? I have been known to perform complex organic reactions with exotic reagents - just for fun (yes I should get out more) is that a good enough reason?

 

If they are trying to reduce 'red tape', why more legislation?

 

So, none of it fills me with joy and my reaction would always be, as little change as possible - fat chance I fear.

[Arthur Brown]

We have the opportunity for The Society and it's members to be seen as highly skilled amateurs and hence licensable for purchasing the listed precursors.

 

Talking with the President of the IExpE at the last UKPS AGM he was very willing to accept that the mindset that hand makes fireworks is totally different from the mindset of someone who creates terror.

 

Sadly I do understand that regulations or none, some precursors will arrive from abroad. -It's probably as easy as getting illegal narcotics into the country, after all it's usually a white crystalline powder!

[Arthur Brown]

I can see powders being supplied as w/w mixtures but that would mean selecting the inert solid to be suitable for all the uses to which the precursor chem could be put. and with some difficulty for their separation.

[digger]

OK I have now read the documents. I admittedly skimmed a few sections.

 

Wayne whilst I respect we need a response from the society and this should be done. There is a very large need for plain English analysis of these documents to be written and published on ALL relevant forums so that there are a huge number of responses from users of these chemicals to the home office.

 

Basically as far as I can tell they are hoping for a tiny response on the poisons form, which means they can then just ban them full stop for home use. This will then open the door for chemicals to added to the list at will. There are some misleading statistics in the document with no real relevance. For instance statistics on the number of people injured be chemical agents with no reference to what they were (most likely kids drinking household products not on the list).

 

So with respect to this form I would suggest that a great number of forums should be lobbied (biodiesel, Metal plating, Science forums, pyrotechnics, furniture renovation, boating, pottery and ceramics, etc etc). It is imperative that they get a good number of coherent responses from a wide variety of users which will make them think twice, as the current system is clearly sufficient.

 

mmmm the second one well again a Ban is a real possibility reading the document, the document also mentions that there will be an on going review of the chemicals on the list. So expect it to grow exponentially over the coming years.

 

Licencing costs between £45 and £615, nearly fell off my chair. No licensing for businesses, so simply register an R&D business for £20 and then pay £13 a year to companies house to completely circumvent the legislation.

 

Again the consultation needs to be brought to the attention of affected groups so that many people can have their say.

 

If the challenge is to reduce red tape then this piece of legislation should just be ignored as it will have absolutely no influence on terrorism at all. If I wanted to I could make HE without going anywhere near any of the precursors on this list. Most HE precursors can be synthesised with extreme ease. In fact all I would need would be a Tesco's and a garden centre. I feel that Banning or Licensing would only serve to make it more difficult to detect terrorists. If any legislation is to be put in place it should simply be a register system (recording of details of online sales).

 

Rant over for now

[dr thrust]

Option 1would be nice, and option 4 wouldn't bother me as I having nothing to hide
A outright ban would only lead to stockpiling,black markets,home manufacture, or reverse engineering of shop bought fireworks ! Those having no effect on terrorist activity what so ever

[maxman]

Option 1 would be first choice. Option 4 fine as along as the licence is nominal cost or as Gareth has said register a non profit business if needs be.

 

Rod

[helix]

I can't see how any additional legislation would realistically make any real difference to the prevention of causing harm by any organisation/ criminal group. intent on doing so.  There are simply so many ways to circumvent these lists by anyone with a little knowledge.

 

I don't know if it would be possible to obtain more details on the 88 cases relating to the misuse of poisonous substances via a freedom of information request - it would be interesting to see how many of these relate to controlled poisons.

[Vic]

I don't see many home users taking up a licence, unless it is straightforward and at a reasonable cost.

Nobody who is just dabbling in the hobby is going to bother and that will create a black market for the chemicals and that in turn will help the very people that this legislation is aiming to prevent access. The paper says that “Homemade explosives have been part of over 70% of UK homeland attacks since the late 1990s”. I would like to know what chemicals exactly and where they were sourced were they brought from our usual suppliers, then I can make an informed judgement. I think there is a hidden agenda here and that is they do not wont the public at large having access to these types of chemicals.

It will be illegal by 2016 I believe, to have these chemicals or to manufacturer them oneself so will that stop a terrorist making a chlorate cell, I think not.

We do need regulations to stop irresponsible behaviour, by a not so small a minority of people. But the responsible hobbyist as phil has pointed out, are going to suffer from these draconian regulations, not the terrorist.

[digger]

I don't know if it would be possible to obtain more details on the 88 cases relating to the misuse of poisonous substances via a freedom of information request - it would be interesting to see how many of these relate to controlled poisons.

 

Also worth checking if the poisons are on the list that they were used by public and not proffesionals, again for which this does not apply.

[whoof]

I was a bit surprised to see oxalic acid on the P1 list

[phildunford]

Whilst having the greatest respect for Wayne & agreeing that there should be a society response, I do think that as many individual responses as possible should be sent. This does after all apply to 'individuals'.

 

Also let anyone who might be interested know about this consultation.

[maxman]

Does this mean that in 2014 we may be able to legally experiment with pyrotechnic articles but shortly afterwards have the right to purchace and use raw materials taken off us? Is this not one step forward and two back?

 

Rod

[phildunford]

Rod, not really related, though I give you it does feel like that!

 

I think this latest c**p is EU related rather than our own sweet government(!)

 

In theory one could be licenced to buy stuff, but It all seems a slippery slope to me. The thing that really bugs me is mention of the 'red tape challange' - anything other than bin the idea  would mean MORE red tape...