First came the Commissioner of Prisons calling for the arrest of anyone recording video of police officers while on duty.
Now comes the Minister of Tourism, Culture and the Arts questioning the legality of photographs taken of people in public places and asking the director of State-owned CreativeTT to provide a committee of the Senate with a written submission on the law as it relates to taking photos in a public place.
Bear in mind that Minister Randall Mitchell is not only a lawyer but a member of Cabinet’s Legislative Review Committee and also enjoys substantial access to the State’s legal resources. One can therefore surmise that in seeking legal advice from CreativeTT’s director, Dionne McNicol Stephenson, during last Friday’s Special Select Committee of the Senate, Minister Mitchell was merely playing to the virtual public gallery for reasons of his own.
The short answer to his question is that there is no law prohibiting anyone from taking photographs in a public space. It makes no difference whether the person behind the camera is an amateur or a professional. Once they are in a public place, they are free to take photos and to share as they will. That freedom is tangentially circumscribed by existing laws against trespassing on private property, physical assault, blackmail and so on.
Additionally, the right to take and share photos does not extend to commercial events open to the public without the producer’s permission, or to commissioned commercial photography. These are areas involving intellectual property rights with which Minister Mitchell must surely be quite familiar.
What is of concern, however, is his questioning of photography in public places mixed with references to aggressive responses by police officers and individuals who do not want to have their photos taken while on the street.
Against the background of the recent call by the Commissioner of Prisons for the arrest of people who record video of police officers on duty, and record and share images of victims of crime, Minister Mitchell’s questioning of the legality of taking photos in public spaces cannot be dismissed as a case of mere ignorance.
While we accept that the technology that has placed cameras in the hands of everyone is often abused in ways that are crude, insensitive and stomach-churning, we are also on our guard against the authoritarian instincts that exploit public disgust to censor public information.
One great thing about communications technology, including camera technology, is the fact that it has given the average person the tools to capture and share information. For us in the media who cannot be everywhere at once, civic-minded individuals who are alert to public-interest developments are an invaluable resource. The technology has also brought a whole new community of citizen journalists into the information sphere who add great value to the public’s various interests and right to know.
Any attempt to circumscribe the freedom to take photos in public places while operating within the law as currently exists must be resisted out of hand.