For J.R.B. The Proof House 'Tyre'.
I took these photos some time back at the Birmingham Proof House. The Provisional Proof is done in an old brick shed and if you have a copy of Greener's book The Gun and Its Development then the illustration in the book is exactly as it is today.
As to who would enforce the prosecution. British law may differ to yours but anyone can take the prosecution before a court be it an organisation or an individual and that includes criminal cases. Yes an Act of Parliament was enacted on behalf of the Proof Houses so that it is enshrined in law. If they took the prosecution out and a person was found guilty then the court would impose a fine. If then the fine was not paid then the court could issue a warrant and a court appointed baliff could act on their behalf and collect the fine. If it was a Warrant of Distress then they are empowered to take as much of the offender's personal property as they see fit to be sent for public auction in order to recover the fine. Even library fines for unreturned books can be sorted this way. As we live in a democracy then the law of the land should oversee these matters so that they can be dealt with in a fair and legal manner. British law is old and complex as I know from spending over 30 years dealing with it as a Police Officer. The oldest piece regularly used is from The Justice of the Peace Act of 1361. One of my most unusal one was when I took the Chief Constable to court. He had to agree I was right and instruced the force Solicitior to throw the towel in but he ran it anyway just for fun and we had a good laugh about it; even the Chief! :-)
I don't view it as Government intervention in my life but a piece of legislation that is there to protect me the consumer from being sold a piece of rubbish that the seller knows to be rubbish without redress. We have similar legislation that covers the quality of gold, silver and platinum so that the consumer is protected.
Please tell me, how many of you would buy an English gun that was not correctly proofed? And if you did buy it I would suspect that that fact would reflect in the price paid. Lagopus.....
