• LONDON’S new rules for developers of new public spaces must ban the use of facial recognition cameras, and I’m calling on mayor Sadiq Khan to make this happen.

Since 2016 I have worked with campaigners to win new policies from the mayor to stop arbitrary rules being imposed in new public squares.

The freedom to sit, socialise, and exercise free speech, in public spaces is so important; but it is being eroded every time a new public space is created and developers ban activities like playing, protesting, or simply being homeless.

We have also seen the even more sinister practice of private CCTV fitted with facial recognition being used on us secretly and without our consent.

In 2017 the London Assembly passed a motion I proposed for new planning policies to fix these problems when new spaces are planned, but we have waited more than three years for the mayor to produce the policy he promised.

A draft new Public London Charter is now out for consultation. I know how important freedom and civil liberties are to Londoners and I hope many of you will join me and call on the mayor to make this policy stronger and to ban facial recognition in private CCTV systems in the new public spaces it will control.

SIÂN BERRY AM
Green Party
Candidate for Mayor of London