MAJOR inconsistencies around the granting of handgun licences across the State have emerged in new figures obtained from the Department of Justice by Fine Gael TD John Deasy.
Some Garda districts have granted no licences for handguns while others in more sparsely populated areas have been much more liberal, issuing between 50 and 100 licences per year.
The data also indicates that the number of handgun licences issued by the Garda is expected to exceed 2,000 for the first time next year.
Minister for Justice Dermot Ahern has responded to the figures by saying that a review of firearms legislation that is being carried out by his officials is almost complete.
Mr Deasy pointed out that in Wexford 108 licences were issued last year. However, in the same period, no licences or very few licences were issued at stations in some of the most populated parts of the country.
"These trends indicate that there are massive inconsistencies as regards licensing and handing out these guns to members of the public.
"Some [Garda districts] seem to be very liberal when it comes to licensing, whereas other districts are very tight."
The inconsistencies proved current firearms legislation was ambiguous and that new, clearer laws were urgently needed.
Mr Deasy was also concerned at the number of handguns now in circulation at a time when gun crime and the murder rate was climbing.
"We shouldn't be liberalising procedures around gun licences when the murder rate is climbing. That just doesn't add up. I lived in the United States and know the damage they have caused there," he said.
The figures were issued to Mr Deasy in response to a series of written Dáil questions he tabled in July.
The data reveals the number of handgun licences issued was 323 in the 12 months ended July 31st, 2005. That increased steadily over the next two years before reaching 1,863 in the 12-month period to July 31st 2008.
The number of handgun licences granted has increased exponentially since 2004 when the High Court overturned a 30-year-old "temporary custody order" banning the licences.
The total number of firearms licences issued, for all gun types, reached 233,934 in the 12-month period to July 31st last. This figure has grown steadily from 215,856 in 2004.
In July, Justice Peter Charleton said that there was "a pressing need" for drawing together into a clear law the multiple "piecemeal" rules on the control of handguns here.
He said reasonable people were "entitled to feel alarmed" about a large increase in the number of pistols licensed for private use in Ireland in recent years.
He described as "undesirable" the "piecemeal spreading" of the statutory rules for the control of firearms over multiple pieces of legislation - five firearms Acts and the 2006 Criminal Justice Act.
Codification of these laws on control of firearms was almost as pressing a need as codification of the laws in the area of sexual violence, he stressed.
Mr Justice Charleton made his comments during a High Court hearing in which a man was challenging the Garda's refusal to grant him a gun licence.
At the time, the Minister said that he would bring legislative proposals to Cabinet in the autumn.
To date, this has not happened.