A CONTROVERSIAL Taser gun used in the stand-off with killer Raoul Moat was rushed to Rothbury in the company director’s boot just hours before his death, MPs have revealed.

Peter Boatman “was inspired by a genuine wish to assist the police at a time of crisis” when he took the untested weapon in his car as officers surrounded Moat.

Northumbria Police told MPs that the weapons were supplied under Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights on the grounds that “a state do everything possible to discharge the state’s duty to preserve life”.

But MPs in a Commons Home Affairs Select Committee said: “We are not persuaded by this argument and express great concern at the implications if this were to be taken as carte blanche to override legislation.”

Pro-Tect Systems lost its licence after late director of operations Peter Boatman, a former police officer, decided to take the experimental X12 Tasers, which were still being tested by Government scientists, directly to police involved in the Moat manhunt.

Mr Boatman is thought to have killed himself shortly after the company’s licence was revoked.

MPs claimed Government officials showed a lack of courage or determination when they gave a start-up business permission to supply Tasers to police despite its close links with Pro-Tect Systems.

Current supplier Tactical Safety Responses (TSR) is staffed exclusively by former personnel of previous supplier Pro-Tect Systems, leases its premises from them, and its website is a “near-duplicate”, the Commons Home Affairs Select Committee said.

They also raised concerns TSR would continue to be a monopoly supplier of Tasers and related ammunition, saying such arrangements previously led to a situation where police forces “faced running out of stock”.

Tasers have been deployed more than 6,000 times since 2004 and were fired in three out of 10 cases, the MPs’ report said. More than 20,000 training cartridges and 20,000 live cartridges are needed every six months.