Online Safety Bill

Lord Browne of Belmont Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 25th April 2023 Lords Chamber

These amendments, in my name and that of the noble Lord, Lord Morrow, will ensure that all pornographic content is regulated in the same way, at the same time, and that Part 5 can be brought into force more quickly to ensure all content is treated in the same way. I believe that was certainly the will of your Lordships at Second Reading. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s views on how this will be achieved. I beg to move.

[Lord Browne of Belmont (DUP)]

My Lords, first, I tender an apology from my noble friend Lord Morrow, whose name is attached to the amendments. Unfortunately, he is unable to participate in tonight’s debate, as he had to return home at very short notice. I will speak to the amendments in this group. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie, and my noble friend Lord Morrow for tabling the amendments, allowing for a debate on how the duties of Part 5 should apply to Part 3 services and to probe what sites Part 5 will cover once it is implemented.

The Government have devised a Bill which attempts carefully to navigate regulation of several different types of service. I am sure that it will eventually become an exemplar emulated around the world, so I understand why there may be a general resistance on the part of the Government to tamper with the Bill’s architecture. However, these amendments are designed to treat pornographic content as a clear exception wherever it is found online. This can be achieved, because we already know the harm caused by pornography and Part 5 already creates a duty to ensure that rigorous age verification is in place to stop children accessing it.

The Government recognised that the original drafting of the Bill would not address the unfinished business of Part 3 of the Digital Economy Act. In 2017, as many will recall, this House and the other place expressed the clear demand that online pornography should not be accessible to children. Part 5 of the Bill is the evolution of that 2017 debate, but, regrettably, it was bolted on belatedly after pre-legislative scrutiny. That bolt-on approach has had the unfortunate consequence of creating two separate regimes to deal with pornography. Part 5 applies only to “provider pornographic content”, which is content

“published or displayed on the service by the provider … or by a person acting on behalf of the provider”.

Clause 70 makes it clear:

“Pornographic content that is user-generated content … is not to be regarded as provider pornographic content”;


in other words, if pornography is on social media or the large tube sites, it falls under Part 3, not Part 5. That means that not all content will be regulated in the same way or at the same time.

Amendment 125A addresses an issue raised by this two-tier approach to regulation. Clause 49 defines “user-generated content” as content

“generated directly on the service by a user of the service, or … uploaded to or shared on the service by a user of the service, and … that may be encountered by another user”.

Encounter is defined broadly, meaning to

“read, view, hear or otherwise experience content”,

including adding “comments and reviews”. By including reviews, that seems to be a broad definition. Does it include a like, an up vote or an emoji? That is an important question that Amendment 125A probes. On this basis, it seems that almost all the most popular pornographic websites are user-to-user services, and therefore will fall into Part 3.

Online Safety Bill

Lord Browne of Belmont Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 1st February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Browne of Belmont (DUP)]

My Lords, it is beyond any doubt that an Online Safety Bill is needed. The internet has been left uncontrolled and unfettered for too long. While the Bill is indeed welcome, it is clear that more work needs to be done to ensure that it adequately protects children online.

There is a substantial body of evidence suggesting that exposure to pornography is harmful to children and young people. Many have spoken in this debate already about the harm of easy access to pornography, which is carried into adult life and has a damaging impact on young people’s views of sex and relationships. For many young men addiction to pornography, which starts in teenage years, can often lead to the belief that women should be dehumanised and objectified. Pornography is becoming a young person’s main reference point for sex and there is no conversation about important issues such as consent. That is why the Bill needs to have proper and robust age verification measures to ensure that children cannot access online pornography and are protected from the obvious harms.

Even if the Bill is enacted with robust age verification, experience tells us this is no guarantee that age verification will be implemented. Parliament passed Part 3 of the Digital Economy Bill in 2017, yet the Government chose not to implement the will of this House. That cannot be allowed to be repeated. Not only must robust age verification be in the Bill, but a commencement date must be added to the Bill to ensure that what happened in the past cannot be allowed to happen again.

I know that some Members of the House are still fearful that age verification presents an insurmountable threat to privacy: that those who choose to view pornography will have to provide their ID documents to those sites and that their interests may be tracked and exposed or used for blackmail purposes. We live in an age where there is little that technology cannot deliver. Verifying your age without disclosing who you are is not a complex problem. Indeed, it has been central to the age verification industry since it first began to prepare for the Digital Economy Act, because neither consumers nor the sites they access would risk working with an age verification provider who could not provide strong reassurance and protection for privacy.

The age verification sector is built on privacy by design and data minimisation principles, which are at the heart of our data protection law. The solutions are created on what the industry calls a double-blind basis. By this, I mean that the adult websites can never know the identity of their users, and the age verification providers do not keep any records of which sites ask them to confirm the age of any particular user. To use the technical terms, it is an anonymised, tokenised solution.

The Government should place into the Bill provisions to ensure robust age verification is put in place, along with a clear time-limited commencement clause to ensure that, on this occasion, age verification is brought in and enforced. I support the Bill, but I trust that, as it makes its way through the House, provisions in it can be strengthened.

Gambling: Loot Boxes

Lord Browne of Belmont Excerpts

Thursday 19th May 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, the Government are committed to ensuring that the UK is one of the safest places in the world to be online, and that includes gaming and gambling. The Information Commissioner’s Office has published the children’s code, which sets out how online services which are likely to be accessed by children should protect them online.

[Lord Browne of Belmont (DUP)]

My Lords, there are two main ways of controlling the use of loot boxes—banning or regulation—so what assessment have the Government made of the effectiveness of Belgium’s ban on the use of loot boxes and the Chinese approach of reducing the number of loot boxes that can be opened on a daily basis?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

As part of our review, we are of course looking at examples from around the world to see what other jurisdictions have done and will set out our responses in due course.

Gambling Advertising

Lord Browne of Belmont Excerpts

Tuesday 1st March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Browne of Belmont (DUP)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Foster, for securing this very important debate. Gambling is a problem right across all areas of our society. It affects people from many different walks of life: poorer people, younger people, military veterans and busy professionals. It often does not discriminate. I have long been of the view that there need to be further measures to protect individuals, their families and communities from the harm caused by problem gambling, such as the stress-related disorders we have heard about this evening.

Many campaigners on tackling problem gambling rightly point to the dangers of online advertising. Gambling companies have increasingly embraced social media as a means of communicating with potential customers. Previous analysis of the public accounts of gambling companies has indicated that around 60% of all gambling advertising expenditure was spent on online advertising. Within that figure there has been a significant year-on-year growth in reliance on targeted advertising on social media and on affiliate social media sponsorship and advertising. Does the Minister recognise the dangers of introductory offer promotion and advertising via social media targeting, particularly on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter? This is still a major issue for problem gamblers online.

Affiliates of gambling companies have a higher proportion of posts in terms of direct advertising. This can be seen clearly when browsing the websites and social media pages of some of our largest sporting teams. Online betting and casino offers such as “Always 10% cashback” and “Claim your free £30 or £50 in free bets” can be found strategically placed on social media posts and images relating to certain football or rugby teams. These often-misleading posts are designed to encourage people to sign up. We know for a fact that many people—regrettably, often those with existing problem gambling issues—are drawn in by these adverts and posts.

It is clear that this industry’s targeted use of social media algorithms specifically is an area that needs to be looked at more carefully. Have the Government any plans to deal with this problem? Have they met recently with Facebook or the other main social media organisations to explore avenues for much more co-operation in tackling these challenges? It is vital that we continue to do all we can, here and in the other place, to highlight and provide that help. It is essential to protect those most at risk from gambling-related harm.

Gambling Act 2005

Lord Browne of Belmont Excerpts

Wednesday 9th February 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

As my honourable friend the Minister with responsibility for gambling has made clear, we will respond to the review in the coming months. My noble friend makes an important point about the role of children. We have looked at the impact of gambling on children as part of our review, and protections are already in place—for instance, to limit children’s exposure to advertising—so we are not waiting for the review to take action where it is needed.

[Lord Browne of Belmont (DUP)]

My Lords, gambling addiction can lead to poverty and homelessness. Does the Minister agree that local councils should ensure that front-line staff are provided with training on harmful gambling so that they can recognise potential cases and are given the opportunity to help those in the greatest need?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

Yes, there is an important part for local authorities to play, just as there is for the NHS. It is right that the industry contributes to treatment costs, and the largest operators have committed to provide £100 million for treatment over four years. As I say, these are all areas that we are considering as part of the review of the Act.

Gambling and Lotteries

Lord Browne of Belmont Excerpts

Monday 14th December 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

The noble Baroness has raised serious issues and has made some interesting suggestions. To be fair, I think that the noble Baroness would agree that gambling advertising is already subject to very strict controls. It cannot be targeted at children and it cannot appear during TV programmes or on websites that are aimed primarily at children. In fact, the ASA is currently consulting on further tightening these rules to limit gambling ads that appeal to children and vulnerable people. Gambling advertisers online have to obey the same rules as offline, but as I have said, the point of this review is to get the most convincing evidence possible from which we can move forward.

[Lord Browne of Belmont (DUP) [V]]

My Lords, sadly, the prevalence figures for problem gambling in Northern Ireland are significantly worse than those for England. In this context, the exposure of people to gambling advertising raises significant additional concerns in the Province. Although aspects of responsibility for gambling are devolved, the subject of gambling advertising is addressed on a UK basis. Will the Minister confirm that the needs of Northern Ireland, and indeed all parts of the United Kingdom, will be taken fully taken into regard as part of the gambling review as it relates to non-devolved matters like gambling advertising? Also, what steps will the Government take to engage with the people of Northern Ireland on this matter?

Gambling Legislation

Lord Browne of Belmont Excerpts

Wednesday 9th December 2020 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Browne of Belmont]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to review gambling legislation.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Baroness Barran) (Con)]

My Lords, yesterday, we launched the first part of our comprehensive review of the Gambling Act with a call for evidence. This is an opportunity to take stock of the significant changes in gambling over the last 15 years. We want to make sure we have the right protections and balance between protecting freedom of choice and preventing harm. I take this opportunity to thank all of your Lordships who served on the Select Committee for your work.

[Lord Browne of Belmont (DUP)]

My Lords, I welcome the reply from the Minister. She will be well aware of the significant concern in this House and wider society about the extent of gambling advertising. As was pointed out by the excellent Select Committee report on the social and economic impact of the gambling industry, the industry currently spends around £1.5 billion a year on advertising. This budget has substantially increased since 2014. Will the Minister first confirm that, in the review promised by the Government, strong consideration will be given to implementing restrictions on gambling advertising to protect individuals who are vulnerable to gambling-related harm? Secondly, will the noble Baroness confirm that the needs of Northern Ireland will be considered, as many forms of advertising are UK-wide rather than solely regional? Finally, can I ask the noble Baroness—

[Noble Lords]

No!

Gambling Advertising

Lord Browne of Belmont Excerpts

Thursday 25th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran]

The main metric that the Government use to measure the extent of problem gambling is the British Gambling Prevalence Survey, which looks at population levels of problem gambling. That has remained unchanged over 20 years, at slightly below 1%. I appreciate the context of the noble Lord’s question: with the prevalence of gambling advertising and promotion, intuitively one would expect that figure to rise, but there is not evidence for that at the moment.

[Lord Browne of Belmont (DUP) [V]]

My Lords, although GAMSTOP has clearly been an effective tool that has enabled problem gamblers to control their activities online, repetitive advertising on social media, particularly on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter, remains a problem. Does the Minister agree that there should be discussions with the leading social media companies to seek a solution which would prevent the reappearance of advertisements which a user has, on a previous occasion, decided to hide?

Shared Rural Network

Lord Browne of Belmont Excerpts

Monday 28th October 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran]

My noble friend gives an interesting example of some of the creativity going on in this area in our rural communities, and I shall certainly share that with colleagues in the department. We have made a start in trying to build rural gigabit connectivity with a £200 million programme that is upgrading public sector buildings to act as gigabit-capable connectivity hubs—that is rather difficult to say—and trying to make them as attractive as possible for investors to encourage further deployment beyond the hubs. I will certainly share my noble friend’s thoughts with colleagues.

[Lord Browne of Belmont (DUP)]

My Lords, in the absence of an economy Minister in Northern Ireland, can the Minister confirm that the additional £155 million allocated by the Government to improve broadband in Northern Ireland can be released in the years 2020-21 and 2021-22?

[Baroness Barran]

I apologise, but I should hate to get that wrong, so I should like to confirm that to the noble Lord in writing.

Gambling: Children

Lord Browne of Belmont Excerpts

Tuesday 15th January 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, that is exactly why the Gambling Commission is consulting on requiring age verification before allowing free-to-play demo games to be downloaded. However, that will apply only to games hosted by gambling operators. We are aware of the problem of games and are waiting for GambleAware to do its consultation, and we will certainly take the issue that the noble Lord has raised into account.

[Lord Browne of Belmont (DUP)]

My Lords, the most common way in which children and young people enter the route into gambling is by the purchase of scratch cards and lottery tickets. These are prominently displayed in many outlets, and it is often difficult for the seller to determine the age of the customer. Is it not time that these cards were put behind shutters, in the same way that cigarette packets are, so as not to entice young people to enter the route of gambling?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, although there may be an intuitive link there, there is not actually conclusive evidence that that is how problem gambling starts. The other point to make is that, while I am not sure that it is a majority, a significant number of children who buy scratch cards and National Lottery-type products do it with their parents’ money and indeed with their parents actually present. The question of whether 16 and 17 year-olds should be allowed to use the National Lottery will be part of the review for the fourth competition for the next national lottery licence.