Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to Senior Coroner Ian Arrow’s Prevention of Future Deaths reports following the Plymouth shooting inquests, what steps her Department is taking to (a) develop and (b) implement a national training regime for police firearms licensing staff.

I announced in my statement to the House on 29 June Firearms Licensing - Hansard - UK Parliament that we are providing funding of £500,000 to support the development and roll-out of a new national training package for firearms licensing staff, developed by the College of Policing and the National Police Chiefs Council. In due course the training will become mandatory for police firearms licensing teams.

The training package will be reinforced and supported by a refresh of the College of Policing Authorised Professional Practice, which was the subject of a consultation from January to March this year. The finalised APP will sit alongside the Statutory Guidance to provide support and guidance to police firearms licensing teams.