On Thursday 26 February, following the highly successful media event, “I’m a Photographer … not a Terrorist”, outside New Scotland Yard, NUJ members organised a meeting on photography and the law.
The meeting, hosted by Photo-Forum was chaired by Jess Hurd. The evening was introduced by photographer, Peter Macdiarmid, with solicitor, Anna Mazzola, from Hickman and Rose and photographer, Andrew Wiard speaking.
You can view two films (funded by the NUJ) of the meeting (above and below) which my friend and colleague, Jason N.Parkinson, was commissioned to make.
Plus click here for info on legal support if you are an NUJ journalist covering the G20 protests over the next few days.
BEDFORD, UNITED KINGDOM – 21.03.09. Anti-immigration detention centre activists march from Bedford Town centre to Yarl’s Wood Detention Centre on Saturday 21 March 2009 in Bedfordshire, England. The protest called for an end to “indefinite” detention of women, men and children. Campaign groups said that, “25,000 people – including 2,000 children – accused of no crime, are detained indefinitely each year at great human cost and great expense to tax-payers.” (Photo by Marc Vallée/marcvallee.co.uk) (c) Marc Vallée, 2009.
Clients : Images are available for rights managed editorial licensing. High resolution images are available on request.
LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM – 25.02.09. Students congregate in London to protest against fees on Wednesday 25 February 2009. Students marched from University College London to King’s College London to demanded free education and living grants for all and opposition to university vice-chancellors’ calls for an increase in tuition fees and to continuing cuts and privatisation on university campuses. (Photo by Marc Vallée/marcvallee.co.uk) (c) Marc Vallée, 2009.
The Joint Select Committee on Human Rights has criticised the police today in it’s report, “Demonstrating respect for rights? A human rights approach to policing protest”, of police treatment of journalists (especially photojournalists) when covering demonstrations.
The report says,
“It is unacceptable that individual journalists are left with no option but to take court action against officers who unlawfully interfere with their work. Journalists have the right to carry out their lawful business and report the way in which demonstrations are handled by the police without state interference, unless such interference is necessary and proportionate, and journalists need to be confident that they can carry out their role. The public in turn have the right to impart and receive information: the media are the eyes and ears of the public, helping to ensure that the police are accountable to the people they serve. Effective training of front line police officers on the role of journalists in protests is vital. Police forces should consider how to ensure their officers follow the media guidelines which have been agreed between ACPO and the NUJ, and take steps to deal with officers who do not follow them.”
Good stuff but, “unless such interference is necessary and proportionate”, I have to say this part of the conclusion worries me for all the obvious reasons.
My understanding is that the National Union of Journalists will issue a statement later today on the report. One thing I will say is this, how the police treat journalists/photographers covering the G20 protests next week will be something I’m sure many of us will be watching and if need be report on in full.
One issue, three protests. Here are three Anti-Scientology Protest slideshows from last year. All images are available for rights managed editorial licensing plus printsales. Feel free to contact us for more info. Enjoy!
Over the last few days I have been reading Lee Miller’s security file and without doubt it is fascinating stuff. You can download the full file here from The National Archives for free.
After working on an investigation about police surveillance for The Guardian, which included surveillance of photographers, I wonder how many years it will take the people in our investigation to get to see their own files?
Kent police said this week that it was wrong of them to film journalists working and the National Union of Journalists said it would like all the files of journalists destroyed.
Publication: Lead story of The Guardian, 7 March 2009, plus pages 14 and 15.
For the last 3 months I have been working on an investigation about police surveillance of journalists and protesters for The Guardian with Paul Lewis. Click on the links above to see what we found out.
