Salford Primary Schools, Big Brother is watching you
Article published: Thursday, November 26th 2009
A row has erupted in Salford between parents, the Council and a data watchdog after pupils at a primary school were “inadvertently filmed” by CCTV cameras while getting changed for a gym class.
Charlestown Primary School installed fourteen such cameras in order to “improve security” following a series of break-ins three years ago. Yet despite assurances to parents that they would be used sparingly the cameras were left running, filming pupils and staff.
The school has been condemned by the Information Commissioner’s Office, a government body which monitors the way in which personal data is used, for leaving the cameras switched on while staff and children were on the premises. However, this ignores the more fundamental question of why a school should need such an intrusive surveillance system in the first place and the effect that it could have on children.
Salford City Council has also trialled the use of CCTV in classrooms in order to “aid teacher training”. Following the incident in Charlestown Primary School, they now intend to conduct an audit of CCTV use in the 82 primary schools in Salford. But in spite of the uproar, the authorities appears to remained convinced of the appropriateness of CCTV systems within schools. In response to the Information Commissioner’s Office report, Salford City Council said: “closed-circuit TV in schools is relatively new, but it looks like it is here to stay and we need to ensure that our procedures and guidelines keep pace with this.”
Charles Farrier of ‘No CCTV’, the anti-surveillance group. told MULE that the cameras would normalise the presence of CCTV for pupils at the school: “If you put children in this environment, they will never know a world without surveillance, and so it socialises them into accepting it as a normal part of their everyday lives: they don’t understand the dangers. Really, the adults around them have reneged on their responsibilities by exposing them to this at such a young age.”
Ruth Michaelson
More: Manchester, News
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