Hi folks. Here is the scenario...

I might be going to work and live in the UAE for a few years. I'll keep a house in the UK, but as far as the taxman is concerned I'm offshore for the duration. I'm not sure how the law stands with regard to the small arsenal I've got locked up in the Testosteroom.

I've a few keepers, but I reckon I could dispose of the lefty Sako 22-250, the lefty Beretta 687 20 ga, the black 870 12ga supermagnum (my days of robbing post-offices are over) and possibly even the lefty Heym SR20 7x64 lovingly accurised by the great Ron Wharton.

I'm wondering how the law stands on the 2-3 rifles and shotguns that I wish to retain. They'd be kept in my safe in a house occupied by my in-laws and I'd have the only key.

Any advice gratefully received.

The is only one place to ask...the police that issue your licence.

Our opinions on this matter are worth exactly what you will pay for them.

Don't sell the Heym! Send it to me in Texas. I'll keep it safe for you. Honest, you can trust me...I can trace my 3rd great grand father to Shepton Mallet. Every other year or so, I'll bring it to southern Africa and you can meet it there and visit it.

Seriously, I hope all goes well in UAE.

You are a member of BASC I expect? They will give you correct advice. I think that a prolonged absence of many months that the police may regard it as a breach of condition...in that a long unoccupied, by you, house may be thought of as being "insecure".

You will, in respect of the rifles, almost certainly be in breach of the guidelines on issue of a Firearms Certificate. A Section 1 weapon must be being "used" to justify its retention on an FAC.

That is the law since Lord Cullen's recommendations after Dunblane. No "use" equates for no justification for continued possession.

Your shotguns, if Section 2, can be held on a Shotgun Certificate, by your in-laws, as the law specifically allows someone to hold a shotgun - with no requirement to "use" it - on behalf of someone else.

I would ask your in-law to apply for a Shotgun Certificate. The police are obliged "SHALL ISSUE" a SGC to him or her in the circumstances I describe. Retain your Shotgun Certificate and have the guns entered on BOTH.

Lodge the rifles with a dealer and surrender your FAC. It is not technically possible to hold an FAC with NO weapons on it. It that respect it is different from a SGC.

Surely if the house is occupied by your in-laws then their shouldn't be a significant security issue?

As to use, as I understand it, this only applies to rifles held on a target condition; there are plenty of inherited stalking rifles about which only come out of the cabinet for Highland Reds once every few years! You can also use the rifles to hunt with on visits to the UK perhaps?

The Police may be sympathetic, I had a rifle on a target condition which I knew I would be unable to use for over 6 months out of a given year, owing to working abroad. Given the family etc. commitments either side of this trip I knew I wouldn't be able to make up the required range visits in the year as a whole. I explained to the FEO and they seemed happy to allow it.