Who's watching?

Here is the sign of the camera eye, articulated on its jointed arm.

CCTV in operation. That is a strange phrase to me. In operation implies the unstoppable force of powerful machinery; the authority of a business-like procedure; an incision made to investigate the corporeal by the rational surgeon. Unemotional, every one. Perhaps the phrase suits the icon of the blanked out, indiscriminate, unfeeling, unblinking camera eye, because the phrase in operation appears in these signs routinely.

With this notice, it's as if the installer thinks, 'in operation' is not powerful enough. Any passer-by is warned - if they'd like to creep back to that site to DUMP RUBBISH at 3am, then unrelenting 24hr recording will be ongoing at that time too.

Surveillance. This word is interesting, because it all depends on your point of view, doesn't it? I might 'keep an eye' on a family member's comings and goings, and I might consider that my dutiful role of care. But if my family member doesn't welcome such scrutiny, they might call it surveillance.

When used on a sign with CCTV, perhaps this word, surveillance, already has within it the possibility that the watchfulness is similarly unwelcome. Perhaps the installer of the sign would like me, passer-by, to construct for myself the identity that 'the sign obviously doesn't reference me, because I'm not doing anything that needs watching'. Perhaps the installer would like only would-be criminals to be alarmed! The word seems generally to fit with the popular theory that crime caught on CCTV is easier to detect, therefore would-be criminals are less likely to commit crimes.

I pass these signs routinely, and I look back with my own jaundiced eye.

Surveillance camera systems are familiar to me in public places. Installed by private and public bodies and by charitable, community or voluntary bodies that span both private and public interests, they're in shopping centres, sports venues, and schools; they monitor transport, keep an eye on places where medicines are stored, and point along streets to vehicles and people.

They create debates about civil liberties, the Big Brother state, an Orwellian future. We can argue whether there is cause-and-effect with crime detection and CCTV.

But, except for the last sign there, none of these signs - cautioning the use of CCTV - in themselves fully comply with the Data Protection Act (1988).

The Home Office Surveillance Camera Code of Practice (June 2013) reminds the installers that they are under a legal obligation to alert the public through signage to the use of cameras, to publish a contact for who's watching, and to explain why the system is needed.

These notices should tell me the identity of the person or organisation responsible for the camera, their contact details, and tell me, passer by, why the camera is there - what, in the view of the installer, is the purpose of the camera system? What's more, The Data Protection Act requires most data controllers, whether they are an organisation or an individual, to register with the Information Commissioner's Office that they are monitoring and processing visual information by camera.

So I have recourse to law if I feel these requirements are breached.

But to whom would I address my questions on the ground, in this physically monitored space? Someone who never put the sign there but who perhaps feels protected by the security it promise? Would they look back at me, and wonder what could be my motive for undermining what must surely be a public good - the CCTV at the school gates, at the road junction, the back lane, the quiet corners?

These signs indeed send out messages about the way we live. They say, at this point, on the behalf of the hidden watchers, surveillance is necessary: you live amongst criminals, opportunists with bad intent, addicts, people who need watching. These signs say, You down there, who might be up to No Good. We're watching you, just to make sure. Perhaps they even construct part of me as a would-be criminal. I start to imagine myself creeping the back lanes with my bag of rubbish.

But then, I wonder if the camera is connected at all? Do I stare at a dummy camera, sited blind and unmoving on the wall? Who knows? We only have the sign to say.

Because we don't have a Town Crier

Here are signs that can tell me much about politics, power relations, responsibilities, legal duties of many parties, the administrative structures that form our democracy, and something about the way time and intention is marked in an urban setting.

So I'll try and keep this post short.

Here are notices at the meeting point between the Local Council and the public.

These are recognisable notices. They have a standard Council logo, use a sans serif print style, have justified text, uniform paper size, and are uniformly fixed to objects by cable ties. They tell us about impending events of public consequence, such as planning applications, licensing laws, traffic restrictions and so on. The notices are all written solely in English and can contain any mix of text, graphics, and handwriting.

Locally, we see multiple copies of the same signs attached to streetlights or other objects under the management of the Local Council. These signs are frequently tied, just above my head height, to objects along routes where there are many pedestrians, or where pedestrians are likely to physically turn, as at a road crossing or other junction. They are clustered in the area that we could broadly say is the town centre, or the main access routes to and from the centre.

I think we citizens of England and Wales are quite keen on these notices. Perhaps we feel these signs are an important part of communication between the Local Councils and the ordinary people in the streets affected by the decisions of our elected representatives.

Of course it could be argued that any power is really retained by the Council: these notices are in a small typeface and placed locally for a limited time so the authorities can defend themselves against an unpopular decision by declaring 'we told you the way to object'.

But it can also be argued that these signs tell us a part of our democratic structure is working. The people putting up these signs declare what the proposal is, which department they are issued from, information on the means of objections, information about appeals, legal status, and contact details.

For my part, I don't feel these signs show power flowing from top to bottom. Rather, these notices have the status that if we want to complain about anything, or have a say about an  application, then here are the details of where, and when, we can do that.

Indeed, even reading a part of these notices is somehow democratising - regardless of who we are, we have access via our street setting to the meeting rooms of local decision-makers.

We're so keen on public engagement, we even have a website for Public Notices for England and Wales: www.publicnotices.co.uk

Here you can look up the notices in an online world where you may not physically be able to read them on the street. (I guess there is a whole discipline about Language Landscapes Online.)

I'm not saying there is not a degree of cynicism about planning or licencing procedures, but these plastic-covered notices, securely fastened, routinely placed, and promptly removed, are perhaps valued, even if the number of those actually following up the invitation of practical engagement in local planning remains small.