Should cameras be banned on sports day?

It's sunny, impossibly hot, and not the weather for anyone to be running around like a maniac outside. Surely that must mean it's Sports Day...

Last year, a guest post on non-competitive sports days certainly captured your imagination (go ahead, read it again and sigh for those of us with this sports day experience). This year, another guest post, from Kim Thomas, asks whether parents should be allowed to take pictures of their little darlings winning or losing (that's if any competition's allowed.....)

Over to Kim:

"It’s that time of year again. Children of all ages are gathering outside in the baking heat to see who can run the fastest, jump the highest, or simply make their way around a “non-competitive” obstacle course.
Many parents enjoy seeing their children compete and like to keep a record of the occasion, either by taking still photographs or video footage. What better way to let Aunt Daisy in Australia know how young Benjamin is doing than emailing her a photo of him coming third in the 20m sprint?

But this longstanding tradition may be coming to an end. Some schools – there are no figures on how many – have banned cameras from Sports Day, just as they have banned them from the nativity play and the summer show.

Understandably, some parents are upset at the ban. It feels like another example of “political correctness” gone mad. After all, they argue, how many paedophiles are going to want to pore over footage of children running the egg-and-spoon race?

The truth, however, is more complicated. I’m a parent governor, and when our governing body came to discuss the question of whether to ban cameras from school events, I looked up the guidance provided by our local authority, Hertfordshire. This explained that the main issue for schools is the Data Protection Act (1998), which covers images as well as textual information. A photograph of a pupil is classed as personal data.

As the guidelines state: “when hosting an event where parents are permitted to take photographs or videos, make it clear from the start that any images taken must be for private use only and ask for them not to be put on the Internet. This is to avoid breaching Data Protection legislation (particularly if a parent posts a picture on the web that shows children other than just their own child).”

That was written in 2004. You see the problem – these days people rarely think twice before posting pictures on Facebook or personal blogs for friends and relatives to share. If other parents haven’t given consent for pictures of their children to be used in this way, then parents who upload photos to the web could be breaking the law – with the tacit approval of the school.

Some parents won’t mind pictures of their children being distributed online. Others will. It becomes a bigger problem if the photographs include a picture of a child whose location needs to be kept secret – perhaps because they are staying in a refuge to protect them from a violent parent. Schools need to tread very carefully when this is the case.

So it’s understandable that some schools have gone for an outright ban. I’m pleased to say that the governing body I sit on decided to follow a middle path: seeking consent from parents before allowing filming, and emphasizing that photographs are for private consumption, not public dissemination. For now, it works. What does your school do?"

Read School Gate on what is the point of non-competitive sports days?

And read more from Kim Thomas:

Arnold Schwarzenegger: man of vision?

Should parents who submit fraudulent school applications be prosecuted?

Should our children be fingerprinted at school?

Comments

[Whimsey]

"how many paedophiles are going to want to pore over footage of children running the egg-and-spoon race?"

I don't know. But presumably those Child Protection Agencies who have the horrific task of working through the vile images that paedophiles do collect and watch, will know.

ie, if such images are of value to paedophiles, then there is a case for banning photos at school events. Also, if there is evidence that 'innocent pictures' are morphed by CGI by paedophiles. Plus, whether there is evidence that they form part of grooming in any way.

No one likes to think that our children are at school with others whose parents are paedophiles, but sadly this must happen, as so many paedophiles are parents themselves.

I know I would not like, for any reason, my children being photographed by other adults who were not personal friends.

[Helen]

No of course cameras should not be banned, although if people are going to put pictures on Facebook they really need to understand the privacy settings. You need to be very careful to ensure that only people you want to see your pictures can. But I am fed up of the prevailing attitude in the UK that everyone is a paedophile, it's ridiculous.

One caveat to the above is where a child in the school has escaped from an abusive relative - in that case parents should not photograph events where that child is involved, otherwise the abusive relative might find them somehow.

[bob]

Of course not. Why?

To those who are scared of "peadophiles": get a grip. I hope you've arranged your life to ensure your children walk across empty fields to get to school because the chances of them being killed by a car are orders of magnitude above them being sexually abused (by someone outside their direct family & friends).

Of course, a lot of people seem to see sexual abuse as worse than death which has always struck me as a bit odd.

[Cathy]

Bob: A good friend of mine was abused as a child and would probably say it is worse than death. No doubt you're of the ilk that would say it builds character? Let's hope none of your children ever get raped, eh?

[Cathy]

Whimsey: I'm afraid you're right. Paedophiles are both obsessive and devious. You don't have to be paranoid to work out that any event or organisation involving young children is going to attract this kind of interest. The only thing that's changed is that those of us who live in the real world have woken up to this and stopped being naive!

[Whimsey]

"Let's hope none of your children ever get raped, eh?"

Or, indeed, killed by a paedophile while walking through countryside, as Sarah Payne was.

But then, Bob, I wouldn't let children walk along or across roadways either.

However, the child-murder that really scared me (on the grounds that someone like poor Sarah Payne could have lived if the children had been escorted by a parent or other guarding adult), was Milly, because at l5 it really does seem unexceptional to be walking along a surburban pavement in a middle class residential area - so to be 'vanished' off the street like that does truly scare me.

[Whimsey]

"Paedophiles are both obsessive and devious. "

It always strikes me as very odd that as a society we never seem to do any kind of truly thorough investigation into what causes some people to become sexually oriented towards children - in particular pre-pubescent ones - and then doing out damndest not to let those causes arise in the first place. (I am assuming the cause is not genetic, though if it should be, then breeding it out of the population would seem to be an obvious solution, though a lesser one might simply be to id those with that trait and keep them away from children/computers/each other, etc)

[Cathy]

Whimsey: Unfortunately I have close knowledge of someone with paedophile tendencies, although he very creditably managed to control them to the extent that no child was seriously hurt, as far as I know and hope. In this case it seemed that the tendencies were developed in very early childhood and were partly due to inconsistent and over-strict parenting and mostly due to bad luck.

[oneopinionatedmother]

i think this is crazy...there is nothing bad about this kind of image, nothing sordid. Why not take pictures? Are we going to ban all images of children for the same reason?
Adverts? TV as well?

children love seeing their own image, and images of other children. That is what is being lost - out of fear of a minority group.

CHild porn on the other hand - hunt them down! but i fail to see what positive effect any ban on photographing kids in their everyday lives could have.

[Kim]

OneOpinionatedMother - I've been thinking about the paedophile thing, and I imagine the problem is not that paedophiles will get a kick out of seeing pictures of children enjoying sports day, but that they'll use the pics to identify "targets" - a pretty blonde five year old say. It does seem unlikely to me, but then I have no real idea of how paedophile rings might work, or how extensive they are.

The real issue here, though, is simply a legal one. The DPA gives us a right to privacy that includes images of ourselves. Parent A might simply object to Parent B publishing a picture of parent A's child on their blog or Facebook page. They don't have to give a reason why - they might just not like it. And that's why schools have to be careful about who they allow to take photographs.

[John]

Yet again a little knowledge is shown to be a dangerous thing. As with so much of the "PC" garbage and the H&S hype, this article is based on a falsehood. The Data Protection Act specifically excludes images taken for recreational purposes, so there is no way that parents could contravene the DPA by taking photos of their (and other peoples') children at the school sports day.

And as for encouraging paedophiles - get a grip! I've no idea how a paedophile operates but I'd be greatly suprised if someone with a need to molest young children or to examine explicit pictures of them is going to be too interested in pictures of sports day - especially when the things they do want are so readily available.

[Kim]

John: you are partly right. The Act states: "Personal data processed by an individual only for the purposes of that individual’s personal, family or household affairs (including recreational purposes)".

The problem is this. If someone takes a photograph at school sports day and posts it on a blog, or emails it to a friend, it is no longer for the purpose of their "personal, family or household affairs". Once a picture is on the Internet, it becomes public property.

The second problem for schools is that they don't necessarily have complete control over who attends school functions. A parent might invite a family friend, for example. Or someone could walk in off the street. So again, that's a possible contravention of the Act.

[Kim]

Sorry I should have made clear that the DPA clause I quoted was one of the things exempted from the Act.

[Kim]

Incidentally, John, I am beginning to wonder if you read my original post, as you seem to be arguing with something I didn't actually say.

[Cathy]

John: so you don't know anything about paedophiles but you'd be 'surprised' if they were interested in sports day photos? Do you really think that's good enough or is this just a chance to roll your eyes at 'PC gone mad'? I know of two paedophiles, one of whom worked as a primary school teacher and the other (now in prison) who was a volunteer with a uniformed organisation. I can assure you that they were very devious indeed and took their chances when they saw them. The advent of the internet is a godsend for such people. Do grow up a bit.

[Kim]

Good point, Cathy - I have a headteacher friend who had a paedophile working as a teacher at his primary school. It was only discovered when the teacher approached a young man (out of school hours): on closer investigation, it was discovered that he'd downloaded paedophile images onto his computer.

[Nick]

If paedophiles are using school sports days to spot targets maybe we should consider removing schools from maps altogether and hiding them under massive tarpaulins, just in case those devious paedophiles work out that a lot of children congregating there daily. Really the paranoia surrounding this is massively out of proportion with the threat and does children more harm than good, making them suspicious of all strangers from a young age- hardly a good start to developing a cohesive society! I can’t help thinking that this attitude also puts children at risk; imagine the scenario where a child is lost. When I was a kid if you got separated from my parents other adults would come to your aid. I wonder how many would hesitate these days, worried they might get labelled as a potential abuser.

[Kim]

Just found this news story, which is strangely relevant:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/south_west/8132487.stm

[starling]

How are photographs I take on my digicam and have on my own computer (NOT the Internet) going to end up in the hands of a paedophile?

At my son's old school we weren't allowed to take pictures of the kids at all, but apparently that was because of muslim parents objecting, not because of paedophiles. At my son's new school we don't have that problem, since it's catholic.

[Kim]

Starling - they're not. The problem for schools is that they don't know what parents (or other people who might be present) are going to do with the pics they take. They could be distributing them anywhere.

I personally think a complete ban on taking photos is unnecessarily cautious - I'm not even sure that, by allowing photos to be taken, the school itself would be in breach of the DPA. Nonetheless, I can see why schools implement bans, because they're easier to enforce than a policy of "only take a photo of your own child, and don't distribute photos outside your own family".

[jake]

Cathy, you are a freak that seems to worry too much. I pity any children you may have. What's the point of having children if you think that everyone is out to get them. It IS people like you that make the world such a dull place.

[Nick James]

Cathy,

I don't understand the point you're trying to make. Yes, paedophiles are cunning and devious and the thought of one working as a teacher is scary. I also recognise that the internet is a 'god-send' for them in that it allows them access to a lot of pornographic material. But what's all that got to do with banning photos at sports days?

[Cathy]

Jake: Charming! My children are happy and healthy, thanks. But people like you make me worry...

[Cathy]

Nick: I'm interested to see how vitriolic some of you men are about this matter. Anyone would think you approved of paedophilia.

(Takes deep breath) Some parents taking photos may have an unhealthy interest in their own and other people's children, OK? And they don't have distinguishing marks. I know two adult victims of child abuse whose lives have been utterly ruined by it. One friend was raped nightly by her father, as were a sister and an older brother, who later killed himself by putting his head on a railway line. She later found out that two of her own daughters had also been raped by their grandfather. Now, how do you think she feels? Can you see why I feel rather strongly that children need our protection?

[Cathy]

Nick James: Re-reading your comment I realise that I confused you with another Nick, for which I apologise. My point about parents photographing sports days stands. I hope you can appreciate why I feel strongly about this apparent dismissal of what I believe to be a more widespread problem than some people want to believe.

[Nick James]

Cathy, accusing someone of being vitriolic and supporting paedophilia when they agree with most of what you say but don't see the link to the topic is not awfully constructive, but let's skip over that.

You are citing lots of examples which are indeed horrific - paedophile teachers, people who have been abused by their fathers & grandfathers - but my question remains: how would stopping photography at sports days have made any difference to any of those cases? People with an "unhealthy interest in their own or other people's children" will - asd you point out yourself - ahve much more cunning, devious and effective means of achieiving their disgusting ends. A ban on sports day photography is silly, pointless and fails to address the problem.

[A Gordon]

Cathy, you do so tend to lose your argument by ending with ridiculous, immature and rather vicious remarks.

[Serena Allen]

One of the most important things you can teach a child is how to lose, pick yourself up and carry on. We can hardly expect such a sophisticated concept to be taught in schools that can barely manage literacy and numeracy now can we?

[Kim]

How odd, A Gordon, that you should pick on Cathy, whose remarks have generally been measured and sensible, rather than on, say, Jake, who accuses Cathy of being a "freak". I can't see anywhere where Cathy's comments have been "ridiculous, immature and rather vicious".

Anyone would think you have another agenda to pursue.

[A Gordon]

I think the comment "let's hope none of your children ever get raped, eh" is a terrible, shocking thing to suggest, even in anger and shows a blatant lack of self control which colours one's judgement on any of her other well-reasoned arguments (with which I happen to disagree, but that's by the by, as after reading the above comment, I really couldn't see the point).

[Nick]

Cathy- what a ridiculous statement, of course I don’t approve of paedophilia, where did I infer that I did? If you read my comment properly you’ll see that I am actually concerned for the welfare of children. You cite many examples of how this issue has affected you, fine, but that doesn't give you the right to go insulting people you don't even know. After all this article isn't even to do with paedophilia, it is your seeming obsession with this issue that has steered most of the debate in this direction.

[Whimsey]

After all this article isn't even to do with paedophilia, it is your seeming obsession with this issue that has steered most of the debate in this direction.
***

This article is entirely to do with paedophilia! What else do you think it's about?

Yes, if there are paedophile parents present at sports days or school events, they are (I assume?) pretty thin on the ground, so the question is, is their scarcity so much that any risk of photos of your children they take ending up on the Internet so small we don't have to bother about it? Or do we say 'make photography at school events illegal anyway' because firstly that closes down that loophole, however small, and secondly it sends a clear 'back off - we're on to you' message to paedophiles exploiting school events.

Again, I think the only way to call this decision fairly is to find out whether such images DO end up on the child-pornography galleries, or not, which none of us here, not working in the field of child protection, can tell.

Making the 'right call' in any situation where the odds are very low, but the consequences if they come up are very high, is extremely difficult. We see this over and over in society, whether it's whether we should screen for cancer or whether we should ban nuclear power stations, etc etc.

It boils down to what I've said on the swine flu party blog - where society acts as a herd, then it can afford to sacrifice some members of the herd to predators for the sake of the rest. In the case of school photography, the 'herd' sacrifices a few children for the sake of the conveniencd and enjoyment of the vast majority of the herd.

[Cathy]

A Gordon: This may surprise you, but I wholly agree, and I apologise for any offence caused by my tendency to post before thinking.

I have, however, had more than enough of such ignorant comments as the following:

'We can hardly expect such a sophisticated concept to be taught in schools that can barely manage literacy and numeracy now can we?'

Weirdly enough. I can't help taking that personally and I resent it very much. Time for me to make my farewells, perhaps.

[Jason Bloomberg]

It's not, "political correctness gone mad", it's, "rampant paranoia and fear out of control".

It seems many people cannot distinguish between "threat" and "risk" these days, jumping to the erroneous conclusion that if it could happen it will, and a good dose of hyperbole thrown in for good measure.

The self-appointed experts ( yes, I'm looking at you Cathy ) do more harm than good.

[Kim]

Actually, Whimsey, I think Nick is right, in that when I wrote the piece, I was trying to say that it's not entirely about paedophilia, it's about the Data Protection Act. Of course, the reason some parents are unhappy about having their children's photographs taken and distributed may be down to concerns about paedophilia, but I think from the school's point of view, it's about staying within the law.

Where I disagree with Nick is that he says it's Cathy who steered the conversation in the direction of paedophilia. She didn't - other people made the connection, and she responded to their comments.

It's important to bear in mind that parents may have other legitimate reasons for not wanting pictures of their children distributed, such as protecting their whereabouts.

[Jason Bloomberg]

Should we ban the photograph / graphic which accompanies this article lest some paedophile is getting their rocks-off over it right now ?

I dread to think where this lunacy is going to take us.

[Nick]

This article is entirely to do with paedophilia! What else do you think it's about?

Well, Whimsey, funnily enough I thought it was do with how schools should interpret the Data Protection Act, in fact paedophilia is only mentioned in the article once, and that’s in the negative sense- as in it is unlikely paedophiles are going to pore over children at a parents day.

[Kim]

Thanks, Nick! After I read the first few comments, I did have the sinking feeling that no-one had read what I'd actually written. Glad that someone did:-)

[Whimsey]

The issue of cameras at school events would not have arisen had it not been for fears of paedophiles.

Why on earth would anyone else care otherwise? I suppose there is a chance that the images could be sold commercially - I always wonder about the people caught on postcards myself, and get cross on their behalf, or, indeed, those caught in news photos etc, but in which case the argument would not have been about school events, would it, but about children caught in commercial photos per se.

Cathy - we've got a troll invasion here. It's notable they're all male (or going by male monikers).

Overall, this isn't an issue that's going to find peace and reconciliation, is it? There will always be those who think the risk is worth it, and those who think the risk is not worth it.

[Nick]

Whimsey- there are plenty of reasons why parents would care about their children being caught on camera other than the tiny risk of paedophiles getting all hot and bothered over images of children in the egg and spoon race. I think Kim’s example of parents wanting to protect a child’s whereabouts (for example if they have been taken into care for their own protection from one or more abusive parent) is far more realistic. Your point about whether it is worth the risk… well we could go to endless lengths, but where does it stop? Hence my original, tongue in cheek, comment about removing schools from maps so paedophiles can’t find them! Oh btw, I don’t get your reference a “troll invasion” could you explain it please? You say that it is notable that they are all men, what do you mean by that? Do you have a particular issue with men? I'd be interested to hear- thanks!

[Nick James]

Whimsey,
I'm puzzled by your attitude to photos in general. For example, what possible harm is it doing the kids in the photo at the top of this article for their image to be displayed on the Internet, or the people caught in postcards or news photos? It's only a picture. Even if someone does 'morph' a photo using CGI, I cannot see how that harms the subject of the morphed photo.
Let's by all means strive to keep paedophiles away from children (particularly the ones who don't have a criminal record and therefore get through CRB checks undetected), but this fear of the captured image is postively medieval.

[Jeff]

"we've got a troll invasion here. It's notable they're all male (or going by male monikers)."

Interesting that you perceive a discussion on SCHOOL issues (if it were intimate discussions based on female genitalia problems, I would understand) as being invaded by males as soon as a few (not the majority) put their point across. Heaven forbid if it doesn't fit nicely alongside yours! Maybe in the future all debates should be female only, with one token male to represent the views of all men.

[Whimsey]

Trolls tend to be rude, scornful, dimissive, belittling and aggressive. That's how to spot them in general. Attacking Cathy in the way she was attacked was troll-like.

On showing photos of children in general. Well, my first thought, vis-a-vis the image above, say, was that providing it was shown with parental consent, then not a problem. However, thinking more, there's a case for saying parental consent is not enough - there has to be child consent too, and children can't give informed consent. That would mean no pictures of children could ever be shown in public. Hmm.

Morphed photos - morphed without any consent, do seem to me to be 'unlawful' even in principle. When applied to sexual images (ie, images that have been morphed into sexuality) then it's unambiguously unlawful to my mind. It doesn't matter that the pornography is 'not real' - ie, morphed - it still depicts a real, identifiable child. Ditto for any adult porn morphing of course!

There are those - including Supermother, quite astonisghinly to my mind! - who argue that if a child porn image is totally CGI (ie, an animation) that no offence can be committed either in composing, distributing or viewing it, as no children were involved. To me, that is the equivalent of expressing child porn in a medium such as words - if we don't allow books/stories/accounts of child porn to be published, we shouldn't allow animations of child porn either. (I'm assuming we don't allow written child-porn to exist legally!)

I'm curious as to another post earlier on, that Muslim parents objected to school photography. Was any specifically religious reason given? Just curious!

On the overall issue of publishing photos of real people, I would argue there is a principle of consent - even if in practice it would be just about impossible to obtain (eg, news footage, etc). To me, my image belongs to me, unless I grant a licence to someone else to make agreed use of it. It's a bit like saying my genome belongs to me! And my body, too, come to that.

(Interestingly, the debate on who owns your body - dead or alive - is legally contentious so I understand. Let alone who owns your cell lines!!!!!)

[Cathy]

Kim: Sorry about that. I thought your piece was as well-researched and well-written as your others (spot the envy?) and I do wish I could learn to bite my tongue or at least typing digits. Thanks for the gallantry!

The same to Whimsey - thanks. I do get over-emotional, but calm down quite quickly; I hope no one else takes these spats as horribly seriously as I do ...

This is a very difficult issue to discuss constructively but I know that only a tiny proportion of the population either perpetrates or suffers these acts and that the rest of us are equally horrified by what adults can do to children. The practical details are not going to be solved by a crowd of people bickering on a blog, that's for sure.

Just a little PS; due to my own experiences I do carry a load of unearned guilt about child abuse for which I suppose I try to compensate.

Now I'll go away and quietly write out 1 000 times 'I must not be defensive'. Hope it does the trick ;)

[phil]

Remember the good old days when the BBC Holiday programme would visit topless beaches and film Brits on holiday. Only 30 years ago, but it might as well be 300

[DS]

This is not about DPA or about paedophiles, this is about schools acting to protect themselves from being sued, the same as some of the over the top safety rules.

What you've also got to consider is that some parents aren't able to take time off for sports day etc. Should they be excluded from at least seeing a photo or video?

[Kim]

DS - can you explain a bit more what you mean? I agree that this is partly about schools covering themselves, but just wondering if you know more about the context in which they could be sued. For example, if a parent found that their child's photograph was being distributed around, say, paedophile sites by someone who had taken a photo at a school event, do you think that that parent could legitimately sue the school?

[Alexei]

All I can say, in my 70's, is thank God one doesn't live forever!

[Rob Bain]

Jake: Charming! My children are happy and healthy, thanks. But people like you make me worry...

Posted by: Cathy | 3 Jul 2009 13:18:33

Sorry Cathy I agree with Jake, people who ban things worry me, I also second the comment by Alexei in his 70's I'm in my 50's, and I think this country (the world) has gone to the dogs. Everyone is so paranoid.

[Rob Bain]

BBC NEWS "The foreign secretary dismisses claims that the Facebook page belonging to the wife of the new head of MI6 breached security"

So this has naff all to do with perverts like MJ, and more to do with (not) padding fat lawyers backsides.

[Rob Bain]

"then there is a case for banning photos at school events"
Posted by: Whimsey

Why don't we lock our children up or make them ALL wear Burqas when they are out, just in case THE BOGEYMAN IS OUT THERE!

"I know I would not like, for any reason, my children being photographed by other adults who were not personal friends."

Posted by: Whimsey

(WHAT ABOUT OTHER PARENTS TAKING PICS THAT YOUR LOT HAPPEN TO BE IN VIEW OF?)

Don't worry whimpsey I suspect if your children take after you they'll be too stupid to photograph.

GET a life man/woman You can't legislate for what is very unlikely to happen.

[Whimsey]

See what I mean about how to spot trolls?

[Rob Bain]

So a little levity, and the fact I have a contrary opinion to your Politically correct, and obviously right one, makes me a Troll?
Isn't that a little Mcarthyite of you, are you now or have you ever been a paedophile?

[TSM]

As the parent of two children with severe Dyspraxia, I'd rather ban Sports Day, to be honest.

[Cathy]

TSM: I think you're very, very brave to say that! I do know how you feel - my children are sporty enough to get by but I was always the last to be picked for games etc. Not the end of the world, as I compensated by doing OK academically, but coming in last in front of crowds of yelling parents isn't a pleasant experience. Of course it's marvellous for the parents of the winners and they're the ones we tend to hear from.

[Cathy]

Rob Bain: I think W meant that calling someone 'stupid' online was an indication of tr0lldom.

Btw, I'm 48 so not much younger than you. And yet you make 'in your 50s' sound so incredibly old! I in my turn expressed concern about J's propensity for calling strangers 'freaks'. OK? His opinions are not my concern.

[V Nabokov]

I am also a male, and therefore apparently a latent paedophile.

Cathy has obviously gone through some damaging experiences, and her views cannot therefore be expected to be objective.

But Whimsey appears to be simply ignorant. Her comment "(I'm assuming we don't allow written child-porn to exist legally!)" is, at least by her narrow view of the world, simply wrong.

By her definition "Lolita" would most certainly be child porn, and should therefore presumably be banned.

And what about Romeo and Juliet? Juliet was, after all, just 13 years old, so Romeo was clearly a paedo, and Shakespeare must have been one as well, or he wouldn't have written about such disgusting filth, would he? Stands to reason!

Somebody metioned McCarthyism, and it was a very apposite comment. The hysterical paranoia displayed by some of the posters on this thread is truly alarming.

And to revert to the actual question, of course it's absurd to ban school photos on paedophilia grounds. It may well be justified in individual cases, where a child is at a known risk, but I can't for one moment imagine that paedophiles would look for random targets on school websites. Nearly all child abuse is committed by members of the family, not random strangers.

So perhaps Whimsey would like to ban having pictures of children around the home, as well? Or at least removing them from view whenever a male member of the family is in the house, lest his latent tendencies be suddenly triggered!

[Pistol Pete]

How can it be that this fine country can take offence to parents wanting to capture parts of their kids growing up to show them when they are older but turns a blind eye to 13 year old kids having sex to get council flats.
Shouldn't people take time to get to know the parents of the kids that their children go to school with in which case they will know who is taking photos of their kid (inadvertently anyway?).
If you are too busy to take time to know who your kid is socialising with then you shouldn't be allowed to take a photo of the kid or his/her friends.
The bottom line part of the photo frenzy is around the fact that parents are time hungry and hence worried about the unknown. If they knew more than what the media told them they might actually say hello to the person taking those pictures and not worry about them being some perv....

[Gerald Harris]

How terribly British to reduce everything to the lowest common denominator.

Paedophiles exist all over the world, they are the scum of the earth. My job as a parent is to protect and educate my children, and make sure they are not taking undue risks. Travel in numbers, scream, yell or do anything to attract attention. Always carry your cellphone, and in my neighborhood take our German Shepherd with you. Guaranteed protection and beware anyone who may try and lay a finger on them.

My 16 year old daughter is both a High School Varsity Cheerleader, and a competitive cheer leader who this year competed at the World Championships in Florida. She must be in countless photos and videos all over the USA. Fortunately only her true friends could really figure out where she lives. Again good parenting.

Paedophiles tend to hang out in sleezy places, and prowl the internet. There are countless ways to protect children from both situations, and at the same time protect ones privacy. It is not rocket science. I may not be a computer expert, but I sure have made it my business to find out how to protect our privacy to the best of my ability, whilst at the same time constantly engage, talk to, and make my children aware of the sickos that do exist.

Most American schools have a yearbook which includes photos of every student. The deal with the schools is that anyone has the right to publish unless the parent signs an exclusion form. This prevents the school from publishing any picture be it the year book or sports. Cameras however are not banned at any school sports meets.

My experience tells me that the pictures that children, particularly teenagers, share on Facebook or their cellphones, are far more likely to get the attention of the unwanted, as opposed to those of Johnny or Jennie winning the egg and spoon or sack race.

Parenting children involves sacrifices. Know where they are, who they are with, and what they doing. Be involved with their lives. Those few things I find will be far more likely to succeed rather than being suffocating and banning simple sports pictures of their children.

[Mark]

You are wrong, a parent's photograph is NOT covered by the data protection act as personal records are exempt from the act.

You are also wrong about paedophiles - they seem to like sexual pictures of children - an egg and spoon race hardly qualifies as sexual. Pictures at a swimming gala would be different, obviously.

[Roddy Campell]

I'm afraid that conscientions and well-meaning people like Kim Thomas are one of the reasons why Britain has become such a ridiculous, difficult-to-live-in, PC society.

Consider this: her intentions are entirely honourable - keep the school out of trouble, obey the rules. Her dedication is exemplary. However, she is so hamstrung by Hertfordshire Local Authority's guidance (not renowned as a source of quotable wisdom) that she takes what is, in effect, a cowardly line of acquiescence at the expense of her humanity.

Unfortunately, well intentioned as this is, it lacks the robust common sense which says 'this is a silly rule: what might happen if we break it? Not a lot. So we'll break it in order to allow the greatest good for the greatest number of people'.

And this sort of dumb obedience is endemic in Britain. The result from millions of officials at all levels refusing to question the nonsense that often pours down from local and central government and the EU (often complete rubbish and badly thought-out kneejerk stuff) is a complete paralysis of humanity and common-sense.

I can't get up, have breakfast and drive across town without inadvertently breaking a dozen rules. I can't even keep the rules without breaking others. Nobody can. No school or hospital would function for more than 5 minutes if it kept every single nit-picking and petifogging regulation that applied to it. And the costs would be huge.

We all have to learn to shrug our shoulders at silly rules, to apply our humanity and courage to select the ones which are really important and to do what we know is right regardless of the consequences.

Traditionally we had very few rules in Britain and we learnt to take seriously the few we had. In France the converse was true - lots of rules and a generous amount of common-sense latitude in their interpretation in order to make life survivable.

We now have far too many rules: often ill thought-out, enacted for all the wrong reasons and attempting to make life 100% safe and 100% fair - or, reprehensibly, to absolve the rule-maker from 100% of the responsibility.

Well, any fool can tell you that life is never going to be either completely fair nor completely safe: so all these silly regulations which chase the last 1% of inequity or danger will never succeed and will invoke huge amounts of the law of diminishing marginal returns along the way.

We need to choose wisely and bravely the silly rules we are going to overlook. Or we will find that through sheer exhaustion of trying to keep every single regulation, we are applying all rules indiscriminately and ignoring the sensible rules and the silly ones in equal proportion. Then Baby P gets murdered and people are jailed for selling apples by the pound.

We need to be wise and courageous: to identify silly or harmful rules, to decide proactively to ignore them and then to take full responsibility for our decisions.

It's the only honourable way and if that philosophy were applied correctly at all levels of government, we would all be better off.

[Quinx]

Where on earth did people get the idea that they own the photons that bounce off them? What is the next step - celebrities claiming to own their exhalations?

Time to reign in the lawyers and legislators.

[jacob]

Chattering, trite, nonsense.

FREEDOM!

[Derek]

If I choose to go to school and film my children at school sports day that is my decision and nobody else's. I don't accept that the school has that much power over me. If individuals wish to sue me then they can, but whether I take photos or not is my decision exercised freely in a free country.

[Tim]

I am sick to death of the 'invisible' PC brigade. Come on, lets have a list of all their names! They are making our country a laughing stock. Some of their stupid ideas just stun me. Next thing you'll tell me is that they want to ban playing conkers or climbing trees...oh, they already have? arrrghh. If THEY want to apply these rules to themselves ..fine, but leave us alone! They are a bunch of interfering idiots.

[annie]

If I cross the street I might get run over by a truck therefore everyone needs to stop crossing roads, if I eat a bread roll I might choke so please everyone stop eating bread rolls. Yes there might be a small chance of a paedophile getting into sports day but, trust me, at my primary school everyone knows everyone else and a stranger is very easily spotted. The danger is the predator in your midst already - the teacher or caretaker who is secretly grooming children, the father furtively looking at young teenagers in his pool etc. so I think the blanket banning of photography at sports day or at the nativity play is a naive nonsense paying lip service to child protection As for non competitive sports days, don't even start!

[Andrew]

It's just a measure of how frightening is the new technology and it's effects on our lives- a digital camera of 12 megapixels is pretty intrusive to anyone and the potential to display any image to the world means the we do need to protect our young people. In the past only one copy would be printed and through a processing company, now there is no control.

[GARTH STRONG]

Competitive sports are a wonderful British tradition that has built sterling qualities of character, perseverance, discipline, spirit and sportsmanship in generations of British youth...qualities that made Britain GREAT! How sad and sorry it is to see the sour mixture of paranoia, perverse thinking and political correctness that would ban parents from taking pictures on sports day and place school sports under a dark cloud of paedophilic paranoia: SICK! SICK!! SICK!!!

As ONEOPIONATEDMOTHER noted below:

"i think this is crazy...there is nothing bad about this kind of image, nothing sordid. Why not take pictures? Are we going to ban all images of children for the same reason?
Adverts? TV as well?"

The perverse political correctness movement/mentality, that abhors competition and individual achievement, and finds evil under every blade of grass, also appears intent on wringing the last drops of British traditions, values and culture from our society. Men and women of good sense and good will must now work harder to preserve and ensure healthy thinking in British society.

[J Mathews]

Worrying about parents filming sports day??.

There is privately run hi- res CCTV everywhere, filming children in chip shops, sweet shops, going to school, having lunch, playing in parks and the street, 24 hours a day, and most people have no control over what is done with the footage.

Is that not of much more concern??

[jen]

Why anyone would want to go to a school sports day in the first place is beyond me! Leave the school to it.

[Cathy]

Jem: LOL! My youngest has just gone off to Sports Day looking all excited ... until I offered to come and watch. I always hated it, anyway, watching her come in last.

[Mike S]

If its the Data Protection Act which is the root of the problem then it needs to be amended. However the guidelines appear to be an over-reaction; surely the same could be argued of all photographs taken in a public place. I find it hard to believe that the courts would ever uphold the idea that a publicly taken photograph infringed the data protection rights of those captured in it. Imagine the repercussions for the media and the picture libraries that supply them.

Its nonsense which should be challenged by us all.

[Andy]

So the state using surveillance cameras to take photographs of us is not personal data and perfectly acceptable but a parent taking a photo of their child which happens to include others is. Are we now allowed to take photographs which include other people in any public place then?

This country has gone completely mad.

[Mike S]

The whole thing comes down to whether the response to any particular threat is proportionate or not.

As is too often the case these days it appears to be disproportionate. As a result we lose more and more of our freedom in life.

Paedophilia is dreadful but the response needs to target those responsible rather than impose
blanket bans on the rights of the majority.

[Mike S]

Andy

Not if they include a policeman.

That too has been banned.

I've heard also of a man escorted off Birmingham New Street Station because he was taking photos of a train.

Could have been a terrorist.

The world has not just gone mad - the jumped up little hitlers have taken over.

[Rocky]

... There used to be a saying that rules were for the strict observance of fools and for the guidance of wise men. Photographing school sports days fall under this adage methinks!

[Kim]

Mark and Roddy - I don't think either of you can have read what I wrote. First of all, Mark: it's true that parents' personal photographs aren't covered by the Act. However, the point is that not everyone who attends school events is a parent (mum might bring her new boyfriend along, for example), and that people who take photos at school events don't always keep them for personal use - they may post them on the Internet.

Now, Roddy. How lovely of you to describe me as "well-meaning". But did you miss the part where I said I was pleased that the governing body of which I am a member decided NOT to ban cameras and videos at school events? We decided that the risk was a fairly small one, and that therefore we should just carry on as normal, but ask parents to keep photographs for private use and make sure none of the parents objected to photos being taken. All fairly simple.

Shame, really. If only you'd read what I'd written properly, you could have saved yourself the long diatribe.

[Rob Bain]

"It's just a measure of how frightening is the new technology and it's effects on our lives- a digital camera of 12 megapixels is pretty intrusive to anyone"

Andrew, How intrusive are the CCTVs that follow you everywhere, in shops, in stations, in company buildings, on buses, on trains, at airports on the high street, or is that a different intrusiveness? At least with a 12 megapix camera, you're able to see who is on the other end, and have a conversation with them should you choose.

[Greg Lorriman]

Unless one explicitly makes all one's facebook info totally public then by default it is a PRIVATE network where only people approved see the information. While the data protection act may violate on private information of this kind nevertheless the information/pictures are private as with a personal photo album.

[John Haynes]

Totally Daft and shame upon all. The main culprit in all this is the "sue crazy society" that has developed. This is greatly aided by a Labour Government with little better to do than draft very poor legislation which is the breeding ground for this nonsense. We need to get back to some basic common sense.

As I understand it and despite all the lurid headlines about paedophile rings, the vast majority of cases involving the sexual abuse of children takes place inside the "family/friends group".

As for data protection issues - total botox. A Government that has gaily lost all the personal details of every family in the UK via the 'post', that still wants the ludicrous ID Card scheme and...

Frankly with this lot and our personal information, we may just as well post it all on Twitter and be done with it. The Law is always an Ass and the amount of replies on this blog seems to indicate we need to repeal an awful lot of poor legislation so that people like school Governors should not have to involve themselves in this nonsense.

[Rob Bain]

For more official thoughts on Sports day madness, please have a look at nannyknowsbest .blogspot .com
It's all good press.

[Kim]

Rob - thanks for the link. I had seen that story in the Mail and it seems extraordinary that an organisation would go to the lengths of banning parents from an inter-school sports event. It just seems like a disproportionate response to the problem. Even if an "unsavoury character" had walked into the school, there would be so many other people about that the chances of them being able to abduct or hurt a child would be fairly remote, I'd have thought.

[Whimsey]

Rob Bain: I think W meant that calling someone 'stupid' online was an indication of tr0lldom.
*******

Precisely, thank you.

Has this blog been cross posted anywhere else on Times Online I wonder? We do seem to have a lot of non-females here suddenly! Are there really all these blokes who normally scan down AM blogs to see if there is something they want to comment on, or have they been lured here from elsewhere?

(Not saying they're not more than welcome to post - politely! - just that I'm curious where they've all come from.)

[P King]

Kim: I believe that your school has been misled on the Data protection Act by Hertfordshire council who are talking nonsense. Independent thinking people must challenge any such "guidelines" issued by faceless bureaucrats. They too frequently hide behind the Data Protection Act and Health&Safety Act as a convenient lazy way of banning things.

[P King]

p.s. to my comment posted at 11.13 am today:

Guidance is just that, guidance. It is not Law, not compulsory, not cast in tablets of stone. it is there to allow people with common sense to read it and over-rule the guidance where they can see the guidance well meaning but totally inappropriate for the circumstances. The guidance may well be wrong in fact, and until it is tested in Court, it is nothing more than a bureaucrat taking an extremely cautious approach to interpreting the Law.

[Claire]

The dp act is so badly misused. It should prevent parents / teachers / governors from gossiping about kids in public situations but doesn't yet it has been interpreted to prevent parents from taking ordinary photos at sportsdays. I don't see how an abusive parent trying to find a concealed child could find them on facebook anyway! If the child was removed to a different part of the country, where would you look?? The chance of being found on facebook is as small as the chance of being found due to overhearing a chance conversation in a pub.

[Frank Upton]

Unfortunately we have developed a sick obsession with paedophiles. Like witches 400 years ago, they do exist, but we tend to see them lurking everywhere and lose all reason and common sense when we think about them.

[P King]

Whimsey asks: "I'm curious where they've all come from."

I found this article linked from the middle of today's first page:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/

[Kim]

P King - I think the Hertfordshire guidance is fairly broad. Nowhere does it say "Schools must ban cameras" - though I do know of some local schools who have done precisely that. It advises schools to consult the views of parents before making any decision.

I also imagine that the council will have consulted its own lawyers before drawing up the guidelines. Having said all that, I've just found a recent story reporting that the Office of the Information Commissioner has sent guidance to local authorities saying schools shouldn't ban cameras from sports day: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1194843/You-ban-parents-taking-pictures-schools-told.html

David Smith is quoted as saying: "We want to reassure them and other family members that whatever they might be told, data protection does not prevent them taking photographs of their children and friends at school events.

'Photographs taken for the family photo album are exempt from the Act and citing the Data Protection Act to stop people taking photos or filming their children at school is wrong.'

Of course, he is arguably a little out of date - now that everyone has a digital camera, does anyone have family photo albums any more?

[Henry Davidson]

What a load of tripe. I'll certainly be taking photos at our schools sports day of my children and if other kids are in the photos I'll offer them to that childs parents. It's a very sad world when everyone is guilty until proven innocent. If you post photos of any kind on the internet then more fool you.

[Henry Davidson]

Oh, forgot to mention... my kids will be competing to win as will I in the Dads race. No time for taking part and all being equal.

[Chris]

Is it just me? Am I alone in being horrified that people with this outlook are controlling the education 'system'?

I wonder what following generation will grow up into? Seems we have achieved paranoid Stalinist control freaks in a generation...

Thank God my children made it to adult-hood without going through this, but I fear for their children.

[Martin W]

I'm not certain that this is correct - as far as I am aware there are NO restrictions in the UK to photographing people when they are in a public place.

Quoting the DPA is to me another example of (deliberate?) mis-interpretation of the legislation.

[Robert Hardy]

Underlying this is the seeming acceptance of the restriction of our ability to document our lives and those of our fellow men. We are mad, throwing our freedoms away, creating a legal strait jacket for our lives. Once, not so long ago, one of the reasons we claimed life in the west was better than life behind the iron curtain was that if you walked on the street with a camera you would not get arrested. Now it is no longer safe to take a photo, soon we wont be able to document the creeping militarisation of our society, the police gunmen that poison our London streets, the concrete barriers, the security cameras, the police thugs hiding their identification numbers. We justify this restriction, not with evidence but ever more spurious "what if" scenario making. Bizarrely we have gone from the world of my childhood when getting your face in the local paper in a crowd scene at the local school fete was a source of pride and pleasure, to one today, where it is in danger of being portrayed as an invasion of privacy, an invitation to crime and a opportunity for a contingency fee funded legal claim.

[Kim]

But a school isn't a public place.

[Dave]

Surely if photographs are taken by parents then the responsibility for abiding by the data protection act resides with the parents and not with the schools?

I have three boys all of whom have been competing over the last couple of weeks with varying degrees of success. I would have no problems with other parents taking photographs of these events.

I cannot believe that paeodophiles comprise more than a miniscule proportion of our population and to allow the fear of them to dominate our lives is just ridiculous.

[Zac Smith]

A school playing field is a public place and anyone can take photographs with the permission of the landowner. If anyone thinks that it isn't a public place I suggest you try defacating and see how long it takes you to get arrested.

[Bry Barnes]

If you're not allowed to take photo's of your own child because somebody else might be in the background why aren't you banned from taking photo's of your own child in a Public place, such as on a beach or in a park? Answer: You're not!! Hence this ban on photgraphing children at a school sports day is beyond reason.

[Kim]

Dave - that point about it being the responsibility of the parents is the point I'm most interested in. Legally, do the schools have any responsibility at all in this matter? No-one seems to know the answer to this.

Zac - lovely. However, I suggest you try breaking into school grounds out of hours and see how long it takes for the caretaker to tell you off for trespassing.

[John]

Whether the DPA applies or not - and I continue with my belief that it is totally irrelevant - there is absolutely no way that the school has any responsibility.

If the DPA applied the data controller ie the photographer and the processor of the data, would be responsible for its safe-keeping and proper use. The school would have no locus. There is also no provision in the DPA for agrieved individuals to bring prosection, this would have to be done by the Data Protection Commissioner.

If the DPA does not apply - as I believe - then its a dead issue.

By the way Zac thats not a definitive test. If I were to defecate on my front lawn in view of passing members of the public I too would be swiftly arrested, that does not make my front garden a public place!