Celebrity and privacy

Admittedly not all of us are Kate Middleton, the girlfriend of Prince William, who has to put up with the incessant paparazzi nor can we expect the protection she has just been afforded as a “well connected special case” by News International of The Sun and News Of the World which expressed its policy that it would not be publishing photographs of the young woman going about her daily business. So no more photographs of her receiving a parking ticket in the meantime-unless the unregulated paparazzi sell.

That aside what protection can a private individual, albeit one connected to a celebrity, expect from intrusive lenses and gossip columnists?

Well,the press has begun to protect children of the famous more over the last year with pixellated images appearing in the “red tops”.

This trend appears to have developed over concerns of editors on becoming embroiled in lengthy and costly legal proceedings and as a consequence of McGregor and others v Fraser and others in which the British filmstar was granted an injunction against two photographic agencies on use of material taken when his family was on holiday in Mauritius. The agencies were also banned on future use of photographs of the children who had not given their consent to the use of the material. Ewan McGregor  also sought damages against the agencies for breach of confidence, invasion of privacy and breach of Data Protection Act 1998 but the matter subsequently settled out of court for an undisclosed sum.

Protection may also be gained from the Code of Conduct of the Press Complaints Commission (headed by the editor in chief of News International)which of late has heard claims by JK Rowling, Alex Kingston and Kate Beckinsale. JK Rowling won her case against OK! Magazine at the PCC since the photographs of her daughter on holiday in swimwear affected the “child’s welfare” since she had suffered attention as a result from her peers at school but the latter two actresses failed since the photographs were anodyne, in a public place (a public street) and could not be said to have affected the welfare of the children concerned.

What this shows is that today for children at least there is greater protection though the PPC’s reluctance to challenge innocuous pictures of children, even when consent has not been achieved, may lead to intervention of Parliament to “tighten up” on the voluntary code which appears not to affect the activities of freelance paparazzi and their insatiable desire for the “killer photogragh” that could net them a small fortune if sold overseas.