A serious accident on the A59 in which a woman died last week. And then there are people who take video footage of the accident, from their car or from the viaduct they came to as disaster tourists. Member of Parliament Jeltje Straatman from Bladel is working to make this a punishable offense. A bill for this must be discussed quickly in the House of Representatives.
Filming the accident on the A59 is not an isolated incident. Earlier this month, the police already handed out fines to people who filmed accidents from their cars in Boxtel on the A2 and in Oss, where a woman died after a collision with a truck. And during an accident in Oosterhout in which a woman died, the police warned people who were filming from balustrades on an apartment building.
CDA MP Jeltje Straatman from Bladel is (together with GroenLinks-PvdA) working on a bill to ban the making and distribution of such images. “We do this for several reasons. Very serious accidents occur, sometimes with fatal consequences. This directly affects people’s privacy. Then you don’t want images of this circulating online for years. That is such an invasion of the privacy of victims and surviving relatives,” Straatman explains.
Many clicks on dodgy websites
“It’s purely about sensationalism. Do you see something happening and do you want to get a lot of videos on the most unsavory websites with all kinds of clicks and likes?” Straatman asks.
Straatman, lawyer and Member of Parliament since October, gives another reason why it should be punishable. “It also gets in the way of emergency services. You hinder the police from doing their work. There are awareness campaigns, but examples show that these alone are not sufficient. As a society, we must therefore set a standard and say that it is punishable behavior if you make such a video and post it online.”
Help the police
Straatman does not understand why the police had to warn so many people in recent weeks not to take images of serious accidents. “It is completely absurd. I thought it was a nice post from the Den Bosch police that makes a moral appeal to society. Do not post those images. But we will help the police enormously if you ensure that it becomes a punishable offense.”
Press photographers are allowed to continue taking images
The bill does make a distinction. Press photographers are allowed to continue taking images, Straatman explains. “If you take photos for journalistic reasons, you also have to deal with journalistic codes. That you do not portray the most distressing cases and cannot see who it concerns. In principle, taking images is punishable, unless there is a clear basis for the public interest that allows you to share the images.”
This concerns photos, live streams and videos, where you can know who the victim is based on environmental characteristics or personal characteristics. “If that person is in a situation in need of help, then you are not allowed to publish and distribute images.”
Straatman hopes that the bill will be placed on the agenda of the House of Representatives within a few weeks.
