Features

From time to time the Association publishes articles written and photographed for this site. The point of them is to add to the knowledge of other members and to help promote our profession.

Check your insurance if you are covering civil disorder stories

The BPPA has had a long conversation with one of the directors of a major camera and public liabilities insurance brokerages regarding their position on claims from photographers who had equipment damaged or stolen during the recent violence.

He explained that they placed business with three separate insurance underwriters and that they were attempting to get a statement agreed by all three so that they could let us know what the definitive position was. As this was being negotiated, the Prime Minister was speaking during the emergency debate in the House of Commons. David Cameron mention the word 'riot' and said that there would be payments made under the 1886 Riot (Damages) Act. This led two of the underwriters to pull back from agreeing the statement until they could get clarification about the limitations of where and how the 1886 Act would be applied.

The insurance broker's own interpretation of the Act says that at no time was a 'riot' declared and therefore they couldn't see how payments under it could be expected. This left them having to make the decision to press the underwriters for their interpretations of the situation but the Association of British Insurers have not issued their guidance yet and therefore none of the insurance companies are prepared to stick their necks out either.

We mentioned that one of the other brokers had told a photographer that their claim would be paid. He was surprised by this given that none of the London underwriters had made a decision yet.

We went on to talk about the cost of policies where full riot cover would be included and his estimate was that the current policies costing between 2% and 3% of the value of the kit insured would rise to between 15% and 20% and possibly more. He said that they would be happy to find any deals out there but that the existence of the 1886 Riot Act would remain a complicating factor.

To sum up, we don't know whether their underwriters will pay out themselves or whether they will pass the costs onto the Government. The worst case scenario would be if the 1886 Act does not come into play but that the underwriters take a very strict line on their policy wording and not pay out if you, as a photographer, went to cover the disturbances in full knowledge of the dangers involved.

The best advice for those affected on the first night in Tottenham would be to say that you went to cover a protest demo and it developed into civil disorder whilst you were there and that you were not able to avoid remaining. The other nights are more difficult because few people went to shoot those events 'by accident'.

If there are pictures of you wearing helmets or body armour anywhere you should consider removing them. Blog posts, tweets and Facebook entries could prove that you knew what you were letting yourself in for as well. We are not advocating committing insurance fraud but you need to decide before submitting a claim what your position at the time was. If you are claiming with any of the major insurance brokers I would suggest that you get a crime number and hold back, if you can, until we get a definitive statement.

Five Thousand Days - The Movie

This Quicktime .mp4 movie was made by Dillon Bryden when he was in Italy overseeing the printing of the first copies of Five Thousand Days in 2004.
(10 mb file)

The 7th of July - One photographer's words

Immediately after the bombings of the 7th of July the Association received a request from the editor of NEWS PHOTOGRAPHER magazine - the house journal of the National Press Photographers' Association in the USA. Donlad Winslow wanted someone from the BPPA to write a first hand report of the day from a press photographer's perspective so that our American colleagues could undertsand a little more of what had happened. Edmond Terakopian answered the call and here is the piece that he wrote:

UPDIG

Our industry is in a state of great change, and established ways of making and working with photographs have been supplanted by entirely new ones. The enormous capabilities and efficiencies of digital capture and delivery have revolutionized the image marketplace at an astounding rate. But they have also created gaps in creative and quality control that have frequently led to confusion, inequities, loss of quality, and unnecessary expense. We recognize the need for worldwide imaging quality and delivery standards that will facilitate reliable and repeatable image reproduction.

Reporting Avian Flu

BPPA member Paul Haigh has compiled a photographers guide to avian flu and how to cover it whilst remaining both safe and within the law. You can find it at www.britishpressphoto.org/avian_flu.pdf The 7th of July - One photographer's words