Permission to photograph banknotes

Richard Jackson made this Freedom of Information request to Bank of England

The request was successful.

From: Richard Jackson

12 August 2008

Dear Sir or Madam,

It is my understanding that it an offence to photograph English
bank notes without written permission from the Bank of England.

Can you please confirm that this is the case (ideally by reference
to the relevant legislation), and if so, provide, for each of the
last 10 years, information on the number of such requests (a)
received, (b) granted, and (c) rejected, as well as details as to
who makes such decisions and how they are made (e.g. policy
documents or training materials).

Yours faithfully,

Richard

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From: Enquiries
Bank of England

13 August 2008

Dear Mr Jackson

We acknowledge receipt of your e-mail dated 12 August (our ref FF 21504).

We will reply in due course.

If you have any queries please contact the Bank's Public Information and Enquiries Group on 020 7601 4878.

Public Information and Enquiries Group
Bank of England

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From: Enquiries
Bank of England

26 August 2008

Dear Mr Jackson

Thank you for your email of 12 August for access under the Freedom of
Information Act 2000 (*FoI Act*) to information relating to requests to
reproduce Bank of England banknotes and the Bank*s policies in respect of
those requests.

Under the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981 (section 18 (1)) it is an
offence for any person, unless the relevant authority has previously
consented in writing, to reproduce on any substance whatsoever, and
whether or not on the correct scale, any British currency note or any part
of a British currency note.

To assist those requesting permission to reproduce images of its notes the
Bank has available a set of guidelines on its website at
[1]www.bankofengland.co.uk/banknotes/reproducing_banknotes.htm

Decisions on whether to grant permission are taken internally by the
Bank*s Notes Division management.

The number of reproduction requests processed over the last 10 years are
shown in the table below.

+------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|Year |Applications Received |Applications Granted |Applications Refused |
|-----+----------------------+---------------------+---------------------|
|1998 |428 |359 |69 |
|-----+----------------------+---------------------+---------------------|
|1999 |312 |268 |44 |
|-----+----------------------+---------------------+---------------------|
|2000 |405 |354 |51 |
|-----+----------------------+---------------------+---------------------|
|2001 |369 |357 |12 |
|-----+----------------------+---------------------+---------------------|
|2002 |376 |368 |8 |
|-----+----------------------+---------------------+---------------------|
|2003 |514 |513 |1 |
|-----+----------------------+---------------------+---------------------|
|2004 |442 |442 |0 |
|-----+----------------------+---------------------+---------------------|
|2005 |476 |469 |7 |
|-----+----------------------+---------------------+---------------------|
|2006 |422 |416 |6 |
|-----+----------------------+---------------------+---------------------|
|2007 |426 |402 |24 |
+------------------------------------------------------------------------+

I hope you find the above information useful.

Yours sincerely

Stuart Allen

Deputy Secretary of the Bank

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From: Richard Jackson

27 August 2008

Dear Stuart,

Thank you very much for this information. You have omitted one part
of my request, however, which is details of how the decisions are
made whether to grant permission or not (i.e. by the Bank's Notes
Division management). Presumably this is not a purely ad-hoc
process, and the Bank holds some information in this regard?

Yours sincerely,

Richard

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From: Enquiries
Bank of England

28 August 2008

Dear Mr Jackson

Thank you for your further email. Within the information contained on the Bank's website regarding the reproduction of Bank of England banknotes, the conditions used to facilitate the decision to approve a reproduction are set out in the on-line application form at www.bankofengland.co.uk/banknotes/reproa...

Kind Regards
Stuart Allen

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From: Richard Jackson

28 August 2008

Dear Stuart,

Thank you for sending this link. However it only says that the Bank
will _normally_ grant consent if those conditions are fulfilled
(emphasis mine). Similarly there are other references on the site
to circumstances under which permission might be granted even if
not all the conditions are met.

As such there must therefore be a wider process than a simple
"checkbox test" for these listed conditions.

Thank you,

Richard

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From: Enquiries
Bank of England

1 September 2008

Dear Mr Jackson

I think that you will recognise that, even though we have sought to provide quite clear guidelines for applicants on what is acceptable as a reproduction, there inevitably remains a degree of subjective assessment within those categories of what is, and is not, acceptable. For instance, Condition 3 states that "reproductions may not appear in an offensive context". But the concept of "offensiveness" is clearly not something that can be rigidly articulated in rules or procedures. There has to be some discretion exercised by Bank management in these decisions and there is no recorded information that specifies how such discretion and judgement must be exercised.

I hope that is helpful to you.

Kind Regards
Stuart Allen

Deputy Secretary of the Bank

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From: Enquiries
Bank of England

6 October 2008

Dear Mr Jackson

I am writing in connection with our email dated 18 September responding to
your request for information relating to requests to reproduce banknotes
in 2007. The number of requests received was in fact 22 and not 24 as
stated in our response to you. I am sorry for the error in our response
and for any inconvenience this may have caused.

Kind Regards
Stuart Allen

Deputy Secretary of the Bank

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