How would you feel if your local council installed CCTV cameras in your suburb in a bid to reduce crime?
Would it make you feel safer whilst walking on the streets, or would privacy concerns outweigh any perceived benefits?
These questions are being considered by residents of Wagga Wagga; a regional centre located in the Riverina region of Southern New South Wales.
High crime rates have prompted the local council to install 26 surveillance cameras around the city; a process that began last week.
The project is expected to take up to three months to complete, and it is hoped to deter people from committing crimes, whilst serving as a useful tool for police to investigate criminal activity.
But while the Council says that privacy has been an important consideration when placing the cameras, some residents are concerned about the impact that the system will have on their private life.
Taxpayers will also incur a high cost for the installation and maintenance of the system – with an estimated cost of around a million dollars to complete, and annual maintenance costs of $30,000 to $40,000.
A ‘Big Brother’ nation?
The use of CCTV cameras in cities is growing – with many cities adopting similar systems in recent years.
The City of Melbourne installed CCTV cameras around the CBD in 1997 in a move to reduce anti-social behaviour and criminal activity.
The cameras run 24 hours a day and footage is constantly monitored by staff so that emergency services can respond quickly in the case of an incident.
Footage is stored by the Council for a period of 28 days, during which authorised persons (such as police, lawyers or victims of crime) may request to access it.
Most major cities in developed nations now run dedicated CCTV systems which observe the public around the clock.
London is also a well-known CCTV hotspot, with the largest network of cameras in the world.
And with an estimated 6 million CCTV cameras throughout Great Britain, many have compared it to the infamous ‘Big Brother’ from George Orwell’s novel 1984, or East Germany under the Stasi.
With the proliferation of CCTV cameras in Australia, some are suggesting that Australia is quickly becoming the next ‘Big Brother’ nation.
Governments and councils who install these systems say that they are necessary to prevent crime, and often spout the familiar slogan ‘you have nothing to fear if you have nothing to hide.’
Despite this, statistics suggest that cameras are not necessarily effective in reducing crime.
While Britain has earned a reputation for the sophistication of its CCTV system, it’s estimated that only one crime is solved each year for every 1000 cameras in use.
Studies undertaken in Philadelphia, USA have found that while CCTV cameras did reduce crime, the results varied from location to location, and the benefits were often negligible.
Criminologists have also suggested that in many instances, increased street lighting is just as effective as CCTV systems in reducing crime.
It is often much cheaper to install extra lighting – and, of course, it does not affect the privacy of citizens. Furthermore, the ability of CCTV systems to solve crimes is often hampered by poor image quality, absence of sound and other technical factors.
Therefore, when the economic cost of these systems is factored in – along with the impact upon civil liberties – we have to ask ourselves, ‘is it really worth it?’
Another argument against increased surveillance is that in smaller cities such as Wagga Wagga, CCTV systems only cover parts of the city.
While the main street will be covered, the Council’s Director of Corporate Services, Craig Richardson, has conceded that ‘the system doesn’t guarantee that 100 per cent of the areas are covered 100 per cent of the time.’
This means that there is the potential for crimes to be committed undetected – or, as some British authorities have suggested, for criminal activity to move to places where cameras have not yet been installed.
Even in larger cities where cameras are prevalent, crimes continue to be committed around the clock – it is simply a fact of life.
The effectiveness and necessity of these cameras is therefore questionable.
However, as always, there are two sides to every argument.
There is no doubt that in some instances, CCTV footage is an effective tool which assists police in identifying perpetrators – or even exonerating those suspected of crimes. For example, the persons responsible for the London bombings in 2005 were identified and captured thanks to the city’s complex camera system.
This goes to show that surveillance can have their benefits in some cases.
What do you think? Are more cameras necessary, or are they invasive and intrusive?
