Online Pornography: Digital Economy Act 2017

Baroness Benjamin Excerpts

Wednesday 26th October 2022 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Benjamin]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what plans they have to implement Part 3 of the Digital Economy Act 2017 to protect children from online pornography, until Ofcom begins any enforcement of the same under the Online Safety Bill.

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

The Government have decided to use the Online Safety Bill to protect children from online pornography. This will provide greater protection to children across a wider range of services, and we expect that it will be implemented as quickly as the Digital Economy Act—if not more so. The Government are committed to bringing the Bill back to Parliament and are working closely with Ofcom to ensure that the implementation period following passage of the legislation is as short as possible.

[Baroness Benjamin (LD)]

My Lords, 18 months ago I urged Ministers to commence Part 3 of the Digital Economy Act, so that we can put protection from harmful pornography in place for children. I was told that that would take two years, so any benefits of an interim measure would be minimal at best. Since then, millions of children, as young as seven, have accessed violent online porn, in some cases causing mental health problems and the urge to sexually assault other children. We now know that Ofcom’s road map for regulation demonstrates that there will be no enforcement of the Online Safety Bill before 2025. Ofcom is taking over three years to begin enforcing laws on video-sharing platforms. Does the Minister now accept that we could have protected children three years sooner, and will the Government now commence Part 3, so that it is enforced until the new Bill is ready to replace it, and protect our vulnerable children?

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

I thank the noble Baroness for those questions. We must be clear about why the Digital Economy Act was criticised. It was originally criticised because it did not cover social media companies, which host a considerable quantity of pornographic material. There are also other sites that it did not consider. It also considered only ISPs as gatekeepers. A number of flaws have been identified in the Digital Economy Act and we will address those with a stronger Online Safety Bill, targeted more at children.