Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill has again urged the UK Government to permit a Scottish pilot licensing scheme for air weapons after new statistics showed the guns still make up half of all firearm offences.

The publication of Recorded Crimes and Offences Involving Firearms, Scotland, 2007-08 showed a four per cent drop in air weapon offences compared to the previous period, but MacAskill stressed that 50% was still far too high.

"Clearly it is good news that the number of incidents involving firearms has fallen, and I welcome the increase in the number of offences cleared up by the police," the Justice Secretary said.

However, he warned: "These statistics show the problem is not going away. The fact that air weapons still account for half of all incidents, while over a third of those being injured and killed by firearms are children, shows more still needs to be done.

"People are crying out for action to tackle firearms, to get them off our streets and out of the hands of dangerous individuals. This is action that I've been trying to take and I will continue to press the UK Government to let us take action.

"I want to pilot an air weapon licensing scheme which will immediately start to address the problem of air weapons which are used irresponsibly and held unnecessarily."

MacAskill repeated calls for the Home Secretary to implement a similar licensing system to the one used currently in Ireland where someone must have a valid reason for owning either an air weapon or paintball gun.

The new figures show the number of air weapons accounted for by the police fell from 684 in 2006-07 to 567 for 2007-08.

The number of offences where a firearm was fired and killed or caused injury to a person dropped by 15 per cent, however, the statistics show that 46 victims (22 per cent) were aged just 11-15, while 38 victims (18 per cent) were ten or under.