Photography is not a crime!

I came across some interesting posts [1], [2] yesterday about the harassment that many photographers are suffering in the face of a growing ignorance of the law by the Police and other authorities.

As the UK moves more and more to a Big Brother state, even Jackie Smith the Home Secretary seems to want to crack down on ordinary photographers! After a series of high profile incidents last year [1], [2], [3], [4] a No. 10 e-Petition was started to raise the case in the public domain. You can see No. 10’s response here, as well as comments about the response.

I got stopped a while ago at Paddington mainline station by some upstart of a ticket guard, thinking that he had the rights to confiscate my camera! He walked off quiet red faced when faced with a number of other passenger protestations!

Yes, I suppose it was private property, but they had better start getting their act together as I am sure many more people will be taking pictures when they travel to visit the 2012 Olympics.

Here’s a copy of the latest The UK Photographers Rights Guide.