The National Union of Journalists has welcomed a court decision allowing a freelance journalist to keep most of his footage of a protest out of police hands.

Greater Manchester Police applied for a court order forcing video journalist Jason Parkinson to hand over all footage shot of a Unite Against Fascism (UAF) counter-protest against the English Defence League (EDL) demonstration in Bolton in March 2010.

Jason opposed the order, with the support of the NUJ – and after weeks of legal wrangling a deal has been struck meaning Jason only needs to hand over a few minutes’ worth.

The NUJ argued that journalists should not be viewed as “evidence gatherers” for the police.

The union’s general secretary Michelle Stanistreet said: “It is not acceptable that the police continue to use production orders to attempt to obtain large amounts of journalistic footage.

“We are pleased the case has been resolved so that Jason can get on with his job as a front-line journalist reporting in the public interest.”

In its initial application, the police force had not provided any specifics about the investigation, what the footage would be used for, and what footage they had tried to obtain already.

In March, the force finally revealed they had a three-second gap in the material they had already gathered relating to a serious allegation of a police officer attempting to pervert the course of justice, and the arrest of UAF protestor Alan Clough.

Jason finally agreed to a revised court order to release less than five minutes of footage. The police have also agreed not to keep the footage after their investigation is over and will pay costs to the NUJ.

Jason said: “We have defended journalistic material from another police fishing trip, we have challenged the production order, forced the authorities to obey the law to the letter and we have stopped them retaining the footage for any future intelligence databases.”

In 2010, Jason and the NUJ fought and won an eight-month battle alongside national broadcasters to stop Essex police seizing footage of the two-day Dale Farm traveller eviction.

NUJ president Barry McCall said: “This important case has once again confirmed that the police cannot attempt to use news photographers as evidence gatherers on their behalf by going on trawls through their material.

“Jason Parkinson is to be congratulated on his courageous stands in this case and the earlier Dale Farm case.”