Six charges in 20 years for buying guns with false certificates

Just six offences of producing a false certificate to buy a firearm or ammunition were charged in England and Wales between 2006 and 2025, Solicitor General Ellie Reeves has told Parliament. The figures emerged in a written answer to Labour MP Ruth Cadbury published on 15 July.

What did the written answer reveal?

Ruth Cadbury, the Labour MP for Brentford and Isleworth, asked how many prosecutions and convictions there had been since 2006 in relation to individuals purchasing firearms or ammunition with a false certificate.

Ms Reeves said the offence most closely associated with that conduct is section 3(5) of the Firearms Act 1968, producing a false certificate with a view to purchasing or acquiring a firearm or ammunition. Crown Prosecution Service records show six such offences charged in 20 years: four in 2021, one in 2022 and one in 2024, and none at all in the 15 years to 2020.

Why can the CPS not say more?

Prosecutors may instead charge these cases as possession offences, depending on the facts. Over the same period, 16,308 offences were charged under section 1 of the Act, which covers possession without a certificate, and 41,166 under section 5, which covers prohibited weapons. The CPS cannot say how many of those involved a false certificate.

A further 3,373 offences were charged under section 5(1A) and 595 under section 5(2A), with a handful brought under the Criminal Attempts Act. Charging activity has shifted over time: section 1 charges ranged from 451 in 2020 to 1,107 in 2008, while the first section 3(5) charge of the whole 20-year period did not come until 2021.

Nor can it say what happened to any of the six cases: the CPS “does not hold management information on convictions by Act and Section”, so no conviction figures exist. The figures count offences charged rather than defendants, and one person can face several charges.

What do the figures mean for certificate holders?

The answer lands in a live debate about the paper trail around gun sales. Ministers are considering tighter controls on private transfers between certificate holders, and the CPS confirmed earlier this month that data on forged shotgun certificates is not collected centrally.

For legitimate holders, the numbers cut both ways: either certificate fraud at the point of sale is vanishingly rare, or it is rarely detected and charged. Both readings are likely to feature as the licensing reform debate develops.

What happens next?

The Home Office has yet to bring forward its proposals on private sales between certificate holders. The full table of charges by year is in written answer UIN 17756 on the UK Parliament website.