Street photo

I was walking to work this morning and happened upon this scene of a man behind a long red and white tape cordon, cleaning the flagstones in Westminster Catherdral Plaza with a high pressure hose. With such gloriously strong backlight from the sun, the spray looked fantastic so I stopped and whipped out the 40D/50mm, still in monochrome and manual mode (MMM) of course, and fired off a few frames, the best of which is this one.

The fag-puffing individual on the left spotted me and rushed towards me. I thought - here we go, the lecture about why it's against Anti Terror legislation to photograph the act of high-pressure hosing on Britain's streets. More realistically I thought it might have a go because of Westminster Cathedral in the background and it was a Catholic thing.

To my surprise, he asked if I wanted to come through the cordon to get closer for a better shot.

I suddenly thought about the leaked memo from Chief Constable Andy Trotter of the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) reported in The Indendent and elsewhere this week, which called upon police forces in the UK to cease their harrassment of photographers on the basis of the terrorist threat. Perhaps the message is getting through quicker than anyone expected.