A VILLAGE store has stopped selling one of its most popular items - toy guns - over safety fears.

Maureen Chester of Ashton Village Saver took over the shop in September last year.

Some of the most popular items of stock at the store included toy guns that take caps and a spud gun.

Maureen said: "I found the guns in the warehouse and there were a lot of caps left over from the previous owner of the shop.

"But even as I was placing them on the shelf last year I thought they looked very real."

Maureen decided to withdraw the guns from sale after police stopped a youngster who had bought a toy gun from her shop.

She said: "Children were coming in all the time for the guns, they were really popular and we were trying to provide a variety of stock.

"But the police called one day to say they had stopped a child with a gun in the road. He told the police that he had bought the gun at our shop."

Maureen has now stopped stocking the toy guns and has said she will not be getting any more in.

Police are often called to incidents involving firearms, some of which are imitations and it is difficult at a moment's notice for officers to tell the difference.

The national gun amnesty ended yesterday (Wednesday) and in that time more than 1,800 guns and 20,000 rounds of ammunition were handed in across Greater Manchester.

Announcing the launch of the amnesty last month, deputy chief constable David McCrone said: "Replica guns are manufactured in such a fashion that even trained police firearms officers would be unable to tell them from the real thing if confronted with them."

New Government legislation will make it an arrestable offence to possess, in a public place, an imitation firearm or air weapon without reasonable excuse.

Maureen said: "On one hand it is a shame to have to stop selling toys that children want, but there are nasty people out there and I am sure there are more exciting things young people can be playing with in this day and age."