Hi guys,
I'm still waiting for FAR to process and approve my license, but a couple of questions have come up.
I'm going to have to move house in the next six months or so. If my license is approved, I plan to hold off any buying any guns until after I've moved to save the hassle of installing, deinstalling and reinstalling a safe.
My license application is for sports (target) shooting, so I understand that there will be participation requirements to meet. How are these applied where you do not in fact own a firearm? Is there an exemption for this, or would I still be expected to meet the participation requirements? I think that I could meet this comfortably by continuing to use the club guns that I have under my P650, but I'm curious as to whether that is actually required.
Another related question I havent been able to find an answer for is what is the participation period for a license holder? Is there a standard participation period across the State, by club, or does it depend on the date on which your license is issued? Is there any risk that a license could be issued a few days before the end of a participation period making it impractical to meet the participation requirements? I'm guessing not, but on the other hand I don't expect the laws to make sense either.
I'm also not clear on what the rules are for ammo possession. Section 65(3) of the Firearms act says that only people who are the holder of a license or permit to possess a firearm which takes that ammunition may possess said ammunition.
Does this mean that I must own a gun in that calibre in order to buy ammo, or is it more broadly that I could buy any centrefire rifle ammo if I held a Category B license? Say for example, if I owned a .308 could I go and buy .223 ammo because my license is for Cat B firearms, or can I only buy .308 because that's the only calibre I own?
The reason I ask is that if I hold off on buying my own firearms, I want to know whether I can go to the gun shop and buy ammo to run through club guns (or other borrowed guns). Clubs obviously supply ammo, but they tend to only have cheap plinking rounds and it's nice to muck around trying different things.