British Shooting, which is also the organisation for Great Britain’s Olympic rifle, pistol and clay pigeon shooting teams, wants to address ‘misconceptions’ about the sport.
‘We will show there is no correlation between street gun crime, which often uses illegal weaponry, and licensed sportspeople using guns bearing no resemblance to those on the street,’ said Good Relations media and strategy director Malcolm Munro.
Good Relations is also tasked with raising the profile of British Shooting as it attempts to reach a target of three medals in the 2012 Olympics. The discipline has been singled out by UK Sport as a likely medal winner at the London Games and is receiving increased funding as a result.
British Shooting will additionally use Good Relations to lobby government as it calls for pistol shooting to be legalised in the UK. A handgun ban was imposed in the wake of the 1996 Dunblane massacre, meaning British pistol shooters currently travel to Switzerland to practice.
