Greetings from Gunchester

somebody had to use the term "Gunchester" to try and imply that gun crime in the UK was out of control.

I'll use Wikipedia for a brief explanation of the term for that fair city further up the Mersey:

Analysts trace the high rates of gun crime in south Manchester, England, to acute social deprivation in an inner city area south of Manchester city centre stretching from Hulme through Moss Side to Longsight.^[1] Whilst by the 1990s, the trade in illegal narcotics and firearms had given rise to Manchester's nickname of "Gunchester", by the late 2000s levels of gang related gun crime had greatly reduced in the area as a whole ".^[1][2] The reasons for this transformation are not entirely clear but the heavy sentencing of main offenders and finding new ways of police, agency and community working and co-operation in tackling this kind of crime may have played a key role.

and grab this table as well from the same article:

Gun crime fatalities by area: 1999–2009

Area	Year
	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008	2009	TOTAL
Ardwick	-	2	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	2
Beswick	1	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1
Chorlton-cum-Hardy	1	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1
Chorlton-on-Medlock	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	2	-	-	2
Fallowfield	-	-	-	-	1	-	-	-	-	-	-	1
Gorton	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	-	-	1
Hulme	1	-	-	-	-	-	1	-	-	-	-	2
Levenshulme	-	1	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1
Longsight	1	2	5	1	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	10
Moss Side	1	-	-	-	1	1	-	2	-	-	-	5
Old Trafford	1	-	-	-	-	-	2	-	-	-	-	3
Stretford	-	-	-	-	-	1	-	-	-	1	1	3
Whalley Range	-	1	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1
Withington	1	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	-	2
TOTAL	7	6	5	1	2	2	3	2	3	2	2	35

Source: Manchester Evening News: "How Many More? Shot dead in Greater Manchester: Accessed 12.12.09".

Wow, 35 dead in a 10 year period! Isn't that what most US cities gun violence rate is in a weekend? Maybe even a bad day?

Well, Gun violence may be out of control by UK standards, but it's incredibly tame by US ones.

Maybe strong gun regulation does work to keep guns out of the hands of the disqualified.