That someone is using a made up law to stop me taking a photo of my child

[Spero]

My daughter is in her first ever drama festival. She is very proud and nervous. I want to take a photo of her. I am told I cannot due to the 'Child protection Act'. I am a family lawyer. I have never heard of this Act. Nor has Google.

So the objection is not that I may disrupt proceedings with annoying camera but that the mere act of taking an photo of my own child is somehow a child protection issue.

I am angry - not so much that I can't take a photo of my precious first born, but for what this reveals about the sloppy muddleheaded approach we seem to have about what 'child protection' really means.

AIBU to be so cross? Am contemplating stern letter of complaint. Making up legislation really isn't on.

I know a school published a photo of a pupil online. The whole family were in witness protection. Someone saw the child and the whole family had to get new identities and move again. Pit cost the local authority big bucks. The issue is if you stand up and take your dds photo how do they know age is your dd.

Sorry predictive text went a bit mad there. Pit should read it and age = she.

It has certainly helped me clarify in my own mind why I was so angry.

But you stated why you were angry in your OP and reiterated the reason over 8 pages.

You were angry because the person you spoke to to ask if you could be exempted from the rules of the festival mistakenly used the word "act" instead of the word "policy".

YANBU Spero

A poster linked to the website of the relevant festival up thread. It contains this statement, beneath the bit about no photos, other than by Official Photographer

"THE LEGISLATION AND GUIDANCE THAT SUPPORTS THIS POLICY:
The Children Act 1989; The Police Act 1997; The Data Protection Act 1998; The Human Rights Act 1998, The Protection of Children Act 1999; The Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000.
POLICY REVIEW:
The Festival organisers will constantly review their policy, revising and enhancing it as necessary. In doing this they will look to The British & International Federation of Festivals for support and that body, in turn will look to other agencies for good practice, most notably the NSPCC and Arts Council of England policy guidelines."

Go get 'em

PS the website has PICTURES OF CHILDREN. PERFORMING.

I have read many of Spero's posts in the past and find her to be a very lovely and knowledgeable person.

So my comments are not at all directed to her, but just general.

That said I wanted to make some comments, even though I have not managed to read all the comments! But wanted to have my two peneth worth, I hope that is OK. And I'm sorry if I say something someone else has said or not.

I do think it is wrong for places to make up rules based on 'not real' laws but I also think it is totally reasonable for individual places to say they will not allow photography either on their premises any time or at certain times (e.g. I believe there are rules about photography on the underground and also some churches will say you can photograph or record during worship services).

I totally agree people will want to take pictures of their own kids on stage and maybe a school should allow it if they are alone. Or maybe the kids who want to be photographed could be photographed at the end.

Maybe it is not against the law to take a photo of an unknown child but I cannot see any reason why anyone should be allowed to do it without asking the permission of the child, or adult with them, (just as I would not take photos of random adults).

The main reason this whole topic is a problem is because of social media and some people's desire to record almost every moment of their own lives (yes but of an exaggeration, but still!) and place these moment in the media. And that they may also in their zeal end up posting pictures of other people's children.

I think it is also important to recognise that the individual children's right to have their every moment recorded, or the parents right to record their children in many different situations should not be valued as greater than the right of children to live in peace and safety. This need of peace and safety and relative anonymity is when there are abusive parents/ex partners of parents/ or potentially risky adults or difficult situations that the child could be thrown into if their location is made known.

As far as the anonymity of the stage goes surely that is also dependant on whether or not the person posting the photo chooses to say 'This is St Elphin's school play in Lower Dungchester'!

Also there is (I believe) already some form of face recognition software, which means people can search photos on line. It might just be this that the vicar was thinking of.

YABU

Am a bit late to this party... but anyway...

Yes, they have quoted an Act incorrectly/ that doesn't exist. However, I really don't think that's too important here from the way the thread has gone.

Children DO get found from photos on social media, no matter how much some of you think it's oh so extremely unlikely for it to happen. It has happened and continues to happen.

Those saying 'it wasn't like this X years ago', and 'it's not like this in my country' - the world is a very very very different place now in term of social media. And those in a different country - the first time a child is tracked down and abused or worse, are you going to say, 'oh well it's only one child and totally worth it so we can keep our freedom to take photos'.

I haven't seen anyone on the 'just take the photo' side explain how they get around the fact that if Spero can 'just take a photo', all the other people watching can take a photo. And they take a photo of a group of children on stage. And in that photo is child who has been removed from an abusive parent. And that photo is put on Facebook. And that photo is commented on and shared and liked. And that child is found by the abusive parent... (for those reading thinking 'as if that would happen', please see point above - IT HAS HAPPENED)

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11947374

FriendlyLadybird - Italiangreyhound has said what I was coming on to say - the stage may we'll be anonymous, but if the comments name the venue or the drama group/school/choir/whatever, that anonymity is gone.

I do think that, if a venue or organisation wants to ban photos of their show or event, they need to compromise by providing a photo opportunity so parents can get a picture of their own child.

And who wants to watch their child's performance through a forest of smart phones and tablets?

First hand story from many years ago (I was there!)

Twins with Down's syndrome given up for adoption at birth.
They were in the local newspaper for something at school.
Birth parents identified them (from local area and age)
Birth parents turned up at the school to meet their children!

So it happened even before social media. Luckily in this case there was no malicious intent. Birth parents met the children but the children weren't told who they were and birth parents happily left it at that.

The 'take photos at the end' rule works well, SDTG. It also means that all children are talking with their parents and if one isn't having their photo taken, no-one notices and asks awkward questions.

If she's solo then damn right I'd be videoing her with one hand and having dp photograph too, don't care what they say. You have every right to take a pic of your child if no one else will be in the piccie!

I have nothing useful to add so I'll just note how chuffed I am that 'pearl -wringing' is now A Thing.

The info for this event it clearly states it's not a safeguarding issue (the Website says that parent/responsible adults are responsible for their own children's safety)

The use of photography is banned because it's a copywright issue.
There is however an official event photographer.

So it sounds as if the child protection stuff is a bit of a red herring

Really, sunshine?

The information about the taking of photographs and videos is under the heading "Child Safeguarding Policy" in the information about this event.

You were angry because the person you spoke to to ask if you could be exempted from the rules of the festival mistakenly used the word "act" instead of the word "policy"

No. I didn't ask anyone anything. An announcement was made before the performance started.

You are wrong to think it a silly unimportant thing to use the word 'Act' instead of a 'policy'.

An Act of Parliament is something very important and very serious. Breaching an Act can lead to imprisonment or a hefty fine. It is very, very different to a 'policy' and people in charge of child protection policies need to understand that. If they fail to understand something so important and so fundamental, what else don't they understand?

Sorry but you can't copyright your child.
Copyright is automatically attributed to the originator of a piece of art (or photography etc) upon creation of such, unless you sign the right away.

Copyright has nothing to do with this situation I'm afraid.
I'm a children's book illustrator so well versed with copyright from an originator's perspective.

THE LEGISLATION AND GUIDANCE THAT SUPPORTS THIS POLICY:
The Children Act 1989; The Police Act 1997; The Data Protection Act 1998; The Human Rights Act 1998, The Protection of Children Act 1999; The Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000.

Interesting. I will need to check the 1999 Act but as far as I know, none of the others could be used unless very tangentially to support a blanket ban in this way.

I also think it would a very rare lawyer who had intimate knowledge of all these Acts and how they inter-relate so I would be very interested to know what kind of training people have who formulate the child protection policies for these kind of events. I feel a FOI request coming on....

I am now really worried.

Just checked the Protection of Children Act 1999, as I dimly recalled it is concerned with employing people who work with children and making sure they are not dodgy. It has nothing to do with parents photographing children.
www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1999/14/contents

I think someone has included it in that list because it 'sounds' right. Because it has the words 'Children' and 'Protection' in its title.

Great. I thought I was cooling off and now I am getting angrier, and angrier. This is a complete travesty.

Whichever poster it was who said this was just like the faffing about at air ports with water bottles - I salute you and wish I had done so earlier. You have hit nail on the add.

This is cosmetic tinkering to try and fool us all into feeling safer when we are nothing of the sort because the people in charge are muppets.

I'm firmly of the view that lots of people, given a tiny bit of power and/or officialdom will take that power to such ridiculous extremes that you quite quickly feel like stabbing them whenever you have to deal with them. Officious little plonkers that have heard some sort of fancy phrasing and reckon they know all there is to know about the subject.

FFS

The police Act 1997www.kent.ac.uk/law/spu/police_act_1997.htm
The Police Act 1997 was one of the final pieces of legislation of the Conservative administration: the Act may be seen, in Part III of the Act which gives wide-ranging powers of intrusive (and hitherto unlawful) surveillance powers to the police, as re-emphasising the conservative commitment to strong law-and-order policies before the general election. . These and other parts were ill-drafted and hastily pushed through Parliament. The Act has five parts: Part I puts the existing National Criminal Intelligence Service on a statutory footing; Part II creates a new national squad, the National Crime Squad; Part III gives wide-ranging powers of intrusive surveillance to the police and customs; Part IV creates the Police Information Technology Organisation (not discussed here) and Part V develops a wholly new system to provide access to criminal records for employment purposes.

My letter of complaint is getting much, much longer.

This list of legislation is entirely spurious.

There might be some waffly Human Rights argument about me potentially breaching right to private life of another child who wandered into shot but I would also have arguments about my right to enjoy family/private life with my daughter.

And the piece de resistance is the Criminal Justice and Court Services act which at section 41 deals with INDECENT PHOTOGRAPHS

www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2000/43/contents

I am going beyond angry into a weird kind of zen calm. So you can just pluck any old Act from anywhere and say it supports your argument.

Being cynical, are they citing 'Acts of Parliament' because if they just ask people nicely, not to take photos, they get ignored?

The elbow of another child may be visible in the shot. I'll let you know the death toll that follows.

What an utterly distasteful comment, OP. I am struggling to square your total lack of compassion for vulnerable children with your being a family lawyer.

Hilarious! Whenever I'm asked for a classic example of pearl clutching, I shall refer to that one.

OP, apologies for not inferring from this sentence in your OP that an announcement was made to all participants before the performance:

I want to take a photo of her. I am told I cannot due to the 'Child protection Act.

I thought I read that you were due at the festival an hour after you posted your OP. So were you actually already at the festival when you posted?

Anyway, it sounds like this announcement was the first you'd heard of the rules about photos and videos - did the organisers not send out those rules with the application and ask you sign and agree to it before submitting your application? Seems a bit odd to spring it on you at the event itself, though these days I think most people are aware that there are rules around this, even if they disagree with them.

And by the way, I didn't say anything about thinking it was a "silly unimportant" thing to use the word "act" instead of "policy". I just said it was clearly what had made you angry and led to you losing sight of who these rules are designed to protect.