I suspect a great many of my parents' generation had unlicensed guns tucked away somewhere as souvenirs of the War. We certainly did - we had a small .22 unrifled gun which my father had deactivated and which I played cowboys or soldiers with, on strict instructions not to take it out of the back garden to where someone might see it. We also had my great-grandfather's .38 police revolver (he'd been a sergeant in Battersea Police in the 1890s) which was kept in a box in the attic. We had no ammunition for either, and there was no question of using either for defence.

My father got rid of the .22 after I left home, and when they made possession punishable by a mandatory 5-year sentence I surrendered the .38 to the police. I hope it made it's way to the Metropolitan Police Museum but I never heard anything.

My point is that these guns weren't kept to be used and in many cases were incapable of being used. Neither that generation nor mine feel the need to arm ourselves for self-defence. If my house is burgled or if I am mugged it is very unlikely that the criminal will be carrying a gun (although a mugger may have a knife) and they in turn can be fairly confident that I won't either. It's the opposite of the Cold War's Mutually Assured Destruction.

I accept that there is a culture of gun and knife violence in some sections of our society, and that innocent bystanders who live in the affected areas may not feel as safe in their homes or on the streets as I generally do. But I truly believe that to most of us it has simply never occurred to us to arm ourselves for self-defence. .

The UK has a largely urban population, and there is no widespread culture of hunting with guns (except in rural areas). We don't have dangerous animals which we need to protect ourselves from. As for national defence, perhaps we are naive but I believe most of us have confidence in our armed forces. Perhaps the fact that they owe their allegiance to the Crown rather than to the government of the day helps.

From this side of the water, I can fully understand the circumstances which in the early days of the United States made the right to bear arms seem to be a necessity. However circumstances have changed, US society has moved on, and now the apparent obsession with the right to own a gun seems to be quaint and outdated, a throwback to a frontier society which mostly no longer exists.