ASK & DISCUSS INDEX

9 years ago - Paddy Robinson-Griffin

The licence from the local authority is about people missing school, keeping vulnerable people safe, etc. I'd suggest you talk to them as they're likely to be supportive

9 years ago - John Lubran

It's usually best to be in good standing with local authorotiestate even if only to avoid hassle. However it's becoming increasingly clear in Actual Law that much statutory legislation, and devolved authority, assumed by local authorities as having the force of Actual. Law is unlawful. The High Court has upheld that schools and Local Authorities do not have powers to enforce school attendance on any legal guardian provided that the child is receiving a reasonable education; a somewhat loose definition that can only be judged case by case. For this reason most schoold and local authorities have suspended all such prosecutions and are expecting to have to repay previously collected 'fines'. Local authorities and police have never had the power to fine or penalise per se.
They can only offer deals not to take you to court. It's a crock. This month I've just won my umpteenth case, acting as a common law attorney, defending against a school expulsion and challenging the lawfulness of the statutory provinance of thier parochial presumption. One just can't make enough of this stuff up.

Expect to see a lot more freedom from overbearing regulation being won through Actual Law in the near future.

9 years ago - Harrington Day

Thanks John but my question still stands - If Children under the age of 18 appear in a short film to raise awareness do they need a entertainment license?

Are you saying as long as we let the children's local councils know what they are doing then that is enough?


Cheers
Harrington Day

9 years ago - John Lubran

Sorry if I'm being unclear Harrington, As ever, the point I make is that when it comes to regulations erroneously purporting to have the force of Law, particularly with lots of statutory procedures devolved to local authorities, the only actual authority they have is that which one acquiesces to. In Actual Law the issue for you is about conforming to Actual Law concerning child labour as differentiated by specific age groups, their protection from predatory people in terms of every kind of exploitation, Common Law Torts and Crimes. Personally I can't see how there exists any kind of licence issued by a Local Corporation (for that is the proper standing of a so called Local Authority) that has any lawful provenance. Where Law and a statute, or a procedure flowing from a statute are in conflict then Law is always superior. Statute Legislation is not the same as Law accept where it flows from Law. Actual Law is Common Law. Currently many lawyers trained under the auspices of the Ministry of Justice and other political presumptions don't believe in the supremacy of Common Law, but no competent and unanimous Supreme Court/Lords decision has ever upheld such treason.

So what I would say Harrington that given your unlearnedness in these things it might be easier for you to just kowtow to which ever authority you believe yourself to be vassal to. Avoiding hassle is often easier than being valorous in the face of totalitarianism! Just hope there's some who carry the flag of freedom under Law for all our sakes. ' Give them an inch and they'll take a mile'.

9 years ago - Tegan Harris

Our local authority says that a child can work for 4 days per year without a licence if:
- they aren't missing school
- they haven't worked in the previous 6 months
- they aren't being paid

My Mum says that she'll give me some useful links later today that I can add to this site. She says that it's worth a call to your local Child Employment Officer and if the children do need a licence, you'll need a licenced chaperone.

9 years ago - John Lubran

It's true that it's what local authorities say but it's not true that what local authorities say is actual law.

Any websites associated with or acquiescent to their presumptions will suffer from the same misdirection. These rules were simply made up under unlawful legislation, the term unlawful in this context refers to a technicality not a crime. For example, any hearing that is not adjudicated under the jurisdiction of Common Law is by definition and as defined in Halsbury's Laws of England "an unlawful administrative hearing". There are actual laws that protect minors that include legislative Acts that are statutes flowing from actual law; but much of these regulations are not them. Such narrowly prescriptive rules such as Tegan quotes have just been made up without proper reference.

Recent examples of structurally similar legislative presumption being blown out of the water in the Supreme Court include that of the Scottish Parliaments assertion that they could impose a "named person " or effectively, a state official, on every child in Scotland with powers of intervention and oversight without reference to the wishes of parents. The judgement applied to that case could very closely mirror one that would follow the as yet to be tested overbearing presumption of the quasi legislative presumption being discussed in this strand.

A significant part of the so called rules that Tegans local council assert have already been successfully challenged in the High Court with regard to enforced school attendance. They are not Law per se.

The real issue is whether or not one is prepared to obey the orders of usurpers and whether or not one has the material and moral resources to stand ones ground. If not humour the little Hitler but at least know that you're doing so.

9 years ago - Susi Arnott

Harrington, how many young people and how many day's work each? What age are they, and are you asking them to miss school? Presumably in each case their parent/legal guardian is already involved/consenting - that's the main thing in my experience.
Have you done Risk Assessments for each day?
And if you're asking them to act to a script, should you be in touch with Equity instead of 'Shooting People'?
Good luck with the production - sounds well worth doing

9 years ago - Tegan Harris

Hi. I'm Nysa, Tegan's Mum

Please excuse me hijacking her account (with her permission) to comment on this thread.

John, regardless of any politcal or legal debates (and I mean absolutely no insult to anyone on this site), as a parent I welcome a structure that gives me some comfort that I'm not just handing my child over to a stranger armed with a camera.

I believe that this is a very different situation to taking your own child on holiday in term time.

The process isn't perfect and I have no expertise on whether it's lawful, but it does at least set some parameters rather than shooters having to understand the laws that protect children. The Council requiring licenced chaperones not only protects the child, they free the shooter up from having to monitor those around the child(ren) and the child's behaviour. This has to be better for the shooter than a bunch of pushy Mums around the set.

Until such time that there is a 'lawful' alternative that is simple to understand and has a monitoring process, protecting the child is, for me, a more compelling argument than a political/legal stand against local authorities.

John, this is an opinion to which I have a right, so please don't get agressive in response. Harrington, I would encourage you to speak to your local officer; they are usually very helpful. Their job isn't to prevent you doing yours.

9 years ago - Harrington Day

Dear all

Thanks for the comments some helpful. I posted this question on behalf of the film which I am merely acting in. The production team already thought they needed to contact each child's respective council and I was just looking for other advice/feedback since no one at this stage in the film production was sure. The organisation that is making this short film has never made a film before.

At this stage I don't have all head counts of children or the details of each child. I was just wanting to know if a child that is featured in a non paid/non profit short film which is about autism awareness needed an entertainment license etc.

Please no more comments on this subject telling me how to look after children and how important it is to protect them and certainly no more constitutional law diatribe that is not necessary to the question I originally asked. I now wish I had never asked what I thought was a relatively simple question. I appreciated those of you who explained why a license is necessary and the criteria of why.

I think somewhere along the line my question has been answered.


Thank you
Harrington Day

9 years ago - Harrington Day

Special thanks to Tegan and mum Nysa:)

Harrington Day

9 years ago - John Lubran

I agree with your essential premise; I presume you're Tegan's mother? Proper protection for children, and indeed everyone, is a good thing and is indeed wholly a requirement of law. It has been a requirement of law throughout the last three or four decades during which so much knee jerk unlawful legislation has been asserted. To what extent vulnerable people have actually been protected from predation and exploitation is evidentially arguable. There's a very long list of major local government failures in these respects. No matter how civil, friendly and apparently helpful these agencies appear, ticking boxes and covering backsides is too often the primary objective. Ensuring that those who one cares about ought not be entirely devolved to and depended upon strangers with licenses. Qualifications are no guarantee of quality as are the lack of qualifications any guarantee of the absence of quality.

But there are other things that arise from this discussion even within the very narrow issue of minors working and being educated. Not everyone and every circumstance ought to be constrained by legislatory blunt instruments. It's about how we ought to be regulated and protected, not whether we ought to be protected.

I've suggested more than once here that people are free to acquiesce to any rules they like; but people ought to be aware of what is actually true and lawful.

Some folk think security is a better thing than liberty; but security has no moral principles whereas liberty is a moral principle. But liberty is not a principle that stands out of context with other morals and duties, to which end we have our sacred Common Law Constitution (Actual Law) which provides for both, with penalties, protections and remedies. Legitimate statutes and by-laws ought not and do not differ from Actual Law. Where they do, for all our sakes, ought not be allowed force.

9 years ago - John Lubran

P.S

At the very moment one raises a question where the jurisdiction of regulatory statutes and law matter, then the issue of legitimacy ought to be an unavoidable consideration. I'm sorry if this is deemed an inconvenience or upsetting to ones sensibilities. Expedience is a double edged sword.

9 years ago - John Lubran

Oh and for the avoidance of doubt. The appearance of children in a factual documentary is not a matter for a local corporation, even according to statutory presumption, except where filming takes place on a council controlled property that's not ordinarily a 'public domain' such as a maintained school. Issues about the protection of minors, of which councils and anyone else have powers to protect, remain. Essentially one only needs the agreement of the minors parent or legal guardian. Where a minor is required to act in a fiction as a professional then child employment laws take force.

9 years ago - John Lubran

There are no laws restricting the filming of children in the public domain other than those laws that that pertain to anyone else who may be present in that public domain. Just don't commit a crime or a Tort, such as misrepresentation resulting in harm.

9 years ago - Tegan Harris

For anyone that does want to look at the Government's revised document, here is the link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/401345/Child_performance_and_activities_licensing_legislation_in_England_-_departmental_advice_-_final.pdf

9 years ago - John Lubran

Thanks for the link Tegan.

There's a few anomalies in that document and nothing that contradicts the central thrust of the points I've made.

Right at the beginning of the document it specifically states that;

"Reference to this advice is not a substitute for reference to the Acts and/or regulations and this advice has no statutory force. It should not be taken as providing an authoritative interpretation of the Acts or regulations as that, ultimately, is a matter for the courts."

No shit Sherlock!

The primary legislation at issue are the Acts of 1933 and 1963. It would seem, unsurprisingly, that those who drafted the document not too confident that their regulatory interpretations actually flow lawfully from those Acts.

This ministerial document then goes on to refer to "regulations" and new regulations that revoke older regulations. It should be noted that when they refer to 'regulations' they don't call them Laws, Acts or statutes. Regulations are not Laws and only have the force of Law where they properly follow Law, which in this case are the two aforesaid Acts. Regulations are what people in authoritative office do when they can't be bothered or they are unable to create them as either statute or Law.

As with all matters of Law, the devil is in the detail, in which respect this document is a shambles. Even those who drafted it must also think it's a shambles because rarely does an 'Official Guidance' to a statute absolve itself from having the force of its own statute. I could go on about the documents unlearned reference to unlawful magistrates appeal processes (that are only on the level of first tier tribunals) that improperly fail to mention in that specific context the option of Judicial Review and a really quite extraordinarily weak set of definitions relating to exceptions and educational requirements. The defining clue however is in that above quotation admitting that only the courts are able to decide what's lawful within the context of a jurisdiction that the drafters of these regulation seem unable to properly understand; or perhaps are rather hoping that the browbeating officialese style of the document will be sufficient to avoid the inconvenience of challenge?

Whilst the intent of this effort is commendable, the intent of constitutional law is even more commendable and provides for everything that these regulations seek to provide but within the far better nuanced and just adjudication of Common Law.

9 years ago - Mandy Bainbridge

Hi Harrington - the LEA have the power to shut down a shoot if your kids are not licenced, there is also a question of whether your insurance will try and wriggle out of any claims if the kids aren't licenced. I doubt you have the time or knowledge to take everyone to court over legalities so as John says, best just kowtow. Are the children following an actual script or just being filmed in their every day lives? Where is the film being shown? Are they being paid for their participation? I also suggest you contact the LEA in the area the filming location resides in, as they are the ones who would come and check on the job if anyone did. When children are licenced, even from different boroughs, copies of their licences are sent to the LEA where the filming takes place. The schools the children attend would also prefer a licence, as some will then mark the children "Educated off site" which doesn't penalise them (the school for their OFSTED reports) for high % absence (even a Code C - Approved absence) still hits a school. So there are many reasons why you should licence, and you have plenty of time. Just ask the the "Children & Young Peoples Department" at the local LEA, then ask to speak to the person in charge of producing Child Performance Licences. I hope this helps.

9 years ago - Mandy Bainbridge

PS - John, I am DEFINITELY bookmarking you for future assistance ;-) My son is highly dyslexic/dysgraphia but loves acting and has done very well. However, his Primary school teacher last year refused to let him have any time off which actually resulted in us home educating for a year, which was actually a fab experience and he has come on so well in his reading and maths etc. However, secondary looms in September, and I don't feel up to teaching that, plus he wants the social side, so if he lands a big role and they say No I know where to come ;-) :-)

9 years ago - John Lubran

One of most glaring and manifestly unfair things about our current system of justice is that of the absurdly high cost. It's effectively one rule for the very rich and another for everyone else. My own local council maintains a £20m contingency fund largely for legal costs. Ironically and despite this massive resource they usually lose defended litigations. Currently the courts have upheld that schools can not refuse time out. This has been a momentous deision because it implies limit to the statutory presumption of local authorities that are likely to be extrapolated to other areas of control yet to be tested. This why power mongers across all levels of government are anxious to appeal that High Court deision. First they'll need to enact new statute; however it won't be easy for them because any Act has to be lawful and there's the rub. Until recently governments could mostly make it up as they pleased because few ordinary citizens challenged them; now they have to be much more correct.

If Mandy's son does land a big role there would be no problem. No authority is likely to intervene when faced with rich and empowered people. I don't imagine that the Harry Potter stars were much inconvenienced. The problem for the 'authorities' is that they've over defined the Law in terms of prescriptive detail. They've created too many chins in the armour of their presumptions. The example of this important school attendance case is profound because the Act under which those presumptions erroneously relied did not give 'authorities' anything like the definitively detailed powers they thought they had. Put very simply parents are legally obliged to ensure that their child receives a reasonable education; that's it! An enforced intervention can only be ordered by a court of law, as opposed to an 'unlawful administrative hearing'. The meaning of the word 'reasonable' in law can be relied upon by the definition provided in the Oxford English Dictionary. Subjective conjecture offered by just anyone ia not effective. Therefore what is reasonable in any specific circumstance is not necessarily reasonable in another. This is Common Law, the actual law of the land.