A Point Of Debate: Photographing Children in the UK
KJM Today Debate
January 26, 2025.
Recent news that a group of illegal entrants to the UK, having been 'housed' in a local hotel, have been hanging around a school, apparently filming and photographing children there.
Clearly there is a debate to be had over this and photography of any kind involving children.
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When did safeguarding kids become a matter of "cultural expectations"?
This is England, not some free for all experiment in tolerance.
Parents in Deanshanger are pulling their kids out of school because asylum seekers, housed at the taxpayer’s expense, are reportedly loitering outside a primary school and filming children.
And the police? They’re busy hosting a seminar on "appropriate behaviours." Honestly, you couldn’t make it up.
Here’s a cultural expectation for you. Don’t hang around schools filming kids. That’s not just British culture it’s basic human decency. And if you’re a guest in this country, it’s not a suggestion it’s a requirement.
Yet instead of reassuring residents and enforcing the law, the police play cultural counsellor. Talk about bending over backwards while ignoring the real issue of public safety. This isn’t about xenophobia it’s about trust and accountability. If these individuals can’t respect our laws and norms, they shouldn’t be here full stop.
The government needs to stop pandering and start protecting. Deport those who can’t integrate, enforce zero tolerance around schools, and remind people that Britain’s hospitality isn’t a licence to undermine its values.
Because right now, it’s the locals paying the price for Westminster’s spinelessness.
David Crabbe
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It isn't against the law to photograph or film children in the United Kingdom. It never has been.
Our problem is that, since 1997, when Blair came to power, a myth has been propagated that there is a legal prohibition against photographing and filming children.
No there isn't.
The result is countless numbers (mostly men) of innocent people have had their lives destroyed by over-the-top police investigations simply because somebody pointed a camera at kids. Including Grandmothers taking photos of the family at a picnic in a local park (yes, really!).
We reached the stage some years ago where Photography clubs banned members under 18 because of the fear of such investigations.
But - there is a difference, a HUGE difference, between innocently photographing anybody regardless of their age and what these foreigners are doing.
They must be stopped.
Kevan James
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Illegal immigrants & asylum seekers should be housed in detention camps & not be able to freely walk into towns, cities & villages. Governments have placed tens of thousands of unchecked, unverifiable men near schools, women & children. Most don’t speak English or know our laws or culture.
Adam Brooks
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It’s in our mentality not to hang around schools (unless picking up your kids) and most of us are at work. I’m a keen photographer (amateur) and there are 2 rare white squirrels in my local park, I desperately want to photograph them but I won’t go because there is a children’s play area there and I don’t want to look like a nonce with a camera in the park.
Sadly poor light during winter has prevented me going early morning or late evening when the park is closed. But I wholeheartedly agree with you, and if my local schools had this problem I would gladly patrol with other dads of course.
James S.
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Often parents themselves are asked not to photograph their own children in school, so how it can be alright for random strangers to do so, defeats me.
Elizabeth Yeld
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A random stranger photographing random children is never ok.
I don't believe it to be a racial issue or a matter for debate. I don't believe for a moment that only asylum seekers or refugees to this, British people do too and it's not acceptable for ANYONE to do it. There need be no debate.
Police and anyone else not clamping down on it immediately is ridiculous.
Random photographing of anyone may not be illegal, but it's not acceptable any more than sitting on someone's picnic blanket in the park without invitation is.
If it needs explaining so be it, and I really don't think it's a racial issue though it has somehow become one.
Issues come when schools and clubs apply blanket bans to photography in a misguided striving for 'safeguarding'. I was told by parents that, sadly, photography was banned at my grandson's rugby club in the 2000's when I was visiting from out of town.
I asked the organiser and was told I could only do so with the permission of every parent. When I asked parents they almost cried at the thought of someone taking photos for posterity and I came away with 20+ emails to share the photos with.
Just this year, parents at my local primary school who could not attend the nativity play could not have photos of the event as ONE parent objected to it being filmed.
It's time common sense stepped in and everyone stopped random photos without reason and didn’t stop photos that provide memories.
Felicity Stryjak
Felicity Stryjack makes some good points but the reason we need to be having a debate about the subject is summed up in the last part - taking photos with good reason should be okay. Yet it is the lack of, as Felicity says, common sense that causes the harm.
Kevan James
By ‘there’s no need for debate’ I meant that the inappropriateness of random strangers photographing children should not be in dispute. The rest needs to be discussed at length - and soon.
Felicity Stryjak
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