Digital Economy Bill

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Alton of Liverpool

Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 20th March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

My Lords, I support the amendment proposed by the noble Baronesses, Lady Jones and Lady Janke, but also the remarks of my noble friend Lady Howe. I want to ask the Minister, when he comes to reply, about an issue that I raised in your Lordships’ House previously, and that is the issue of suicide sites on the internet. It concerns me that young people can be encouraged to visit those sites and take their own lives. Only a year ago I attended a school prize giving in a north-west school, and the headmaster told me when I arrived how a child in that school had taken their own life only the day before. As noble Lords can imagine, that was a terrible tragedy not only for the family but for the whole school, and it rather changed the atmosphere on that occasion. That child had been visiting one of the suicide sites on the internet, and the headmaster discovered that several other children had been doing the same.

It can be revenge porn or the kind of trolling to which the noble Baroness referred, the harassment of young women in particular, or the whipping up of xenophobia, racism or anti-Semitism, but it is right that there should be a code of practice, and we should get on with it. I hope that the Minister will tell us more about the Green Paper, what the framework will be for it and when we are going to start to look at these issues seriously.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I am grateful to all contributors on this important subject. We take the harm caused by online abuse and harassment very seriously. The measures that we have introduced in this Bill show that the Government are taking this seriously. I hope that I can offer some comfort in this area since we last discussed these two amendments in Committee.

Amendment 25YR seeks to require Ministers to issue a mandatory code of practice to ensure that commercial social media platform providers show a duty of care to ensure the safety of a child or young person using their service; to report and remove illegal posts on social media; prohibit and remove cyberbullying; and to undertake to work with the education profession and charities to provide children with digital safety skills. Amendment 33A seeks to impose a duty on “social media services” to respond to reports posted on their site of material which passes the “criminal test”, being that the content would, if published by other means or communicated in person, cause a criminal offence to be committed. I have two responses to these amendments—first, an explanation of the work that this Government have started to address these issues through our internet safety strategy; and, secondly, some fundamental concerns about their drafting.

The UK is leading the way in online safety, and will continue to do so, with the support of industry, parents, charities, academics, and other experts, and this is a firm priority for this Government. We have been absolutely clear that abusive and threatening behaviour is totally unacceptable in any form, online or offline. On 27 February, my department announced that it is leading cross-government work on an internet safety strategy which aims to make the UK the safest place in the world to go online for children and young people. This work will also address the abuse that women suffer online, as we look at trolling and other aggressive behaviour, including rape threats. We will ask experts, social media companies, tech firms, charities and young people themselves about online safety during a series of round tables later this month, and we will use these discussions to understand more about the scope of the problem and identify where there are gaps in our current approach to tackling online harms.

We will continue to consult closely with interested parties throughout the spring, including Members of this House with expertise in this area. Indeed, we have already invited several noble Lords to take part. A key part of this work will be to clearly set out the responsibilities of social media in respect of online safety as part of a Green Paper which will be published in June. Other priorities will include: how to help young people to avoid risks online; helping parents to face up to the dangers and discuss them with their children; and how technology can help provide solutions.

We have not ruled anything out at this stage, including a code of practice, but this is a complex field and to find the right solution we need to take the time to have a proper conversation with all the leading stakeholders. We would not want anything to prejudge the outcome of these discussions. We believe that this will result in a properly considered, comprehensive approach to online safety which stakeholders are fully signed up to, and one that will deliver the long-lasting protections that these amendments are seeking to secure.

Immigration Bill

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Alton of Liverpool

Wednesday 20th January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I completely agree that it is an important point and I will be happy to write to the noble Lord and others who have spoken on this after our session in Committee today.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

I am grateful to the Minister for his response to the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy. Can he be clear in that response on the distinction that is being made between voluntary activity and voluntary work, which I found very difficult to understand, and I am sure that many in the field will find it perplexing too. Their worry will be that either they as organisations or some of those asylum seekers who are involved in voluntary activities could find themselves prejudiced against or even prosecuted. These are significant issues that need to be addressed in some detail.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I take the point from the noble Lord, and that is why it would be better if our response was written down once we had had a chance to think about it carefully and get our definitions right. I will circulate the response and put a copy in the Library of the House so that voluntary organisations know where they are.