Baroness Howe of Idlicote
Main Page: Baroness Howe of Idlicote (Crossbench - Life peer)Online Safety Bill [HL]
Baroness Howe of Idlicote Excerpts
Baroness Howe of Idlicote
My Lords, the internet has transformed our way of life. It is one of the big human success stories that have happened during my lifetime. Access to the internet has grown rapidly and continues to grow. However, the expansion of the internet also poses significant child protection concerns in terms of access to pornography and other adult material. Certainly, child safety challenges have moved on very significantly indeed since my time as chairman of the Broadcasting Standards Commission, back in the 1990s, when the internet, as we know it today, barely existed.
In this context, I have tabled the Bill because I am concerned that the internet has made harmful material, previously inaccessible to children and young people, now readily accessible. As a recent report to the UK Council for Child Internet Safety Evidence Group said,
“the volume of harmful content is greater than before and the bar to access is much lower”.
I am also concerned about the consequential increased sexualisation of our young people, as demonstrated by a number of recent reports to government. In 2010, when Linda Papadopoulos investigated the sexualisation of young people, she reported:
“Pornography shapes young people’s sexual knowledge but does so by portraying sex in unrealistic ways … it is increasingly dominated by themes of aggression, power and control”.
When Tanya Byron produced an update on her 2008 review in 2010, she said:
“When talking to parents I have found that their top digital safety concern is easy access to pornography and inappropriate adult content”.
Some of these concerns have been very much in the news this year with the Rochdale and Oxford grooming cases and, more recently, the shocking revelations about Jimmy Savile. In evidence on the Rochdale case to the Home Affairs Select Committee in June, the Deputy Children’s Commissioner said that,
“the evidence we have been gathering is that pornography is definitely having an impact. Young people are accessing very extreme pornography; there is no question about that … Parents may think that they can control what is going on because they can have a blockage on a computer, but the reality is children can get anything they like on their mobile phones, and they are”.
We have also witnessed increasing public concern manifest variously through the Safety Net campaign petition with more than 100,000 signatures, the Daily Mail’s “Block Online Porn” campaign and the seminal Independent Parliamentary Inquiry into Online Child Protection.
In approaching this subject area, we have to ask ourselves a question. Why is there a whole series of protections that pertain to children offline that are spirited away when we move to the online world? Children do not mysteriously change and become more mature when online than offline. I believe that children need, and more importantly deserve, the same protections offline as apply online. However, it is not just about the children. It is also about the parents who say again and again that they want to be given the tools to get on and parent. It is with this in mind that I propose the Online Safety Bill today.
The objective of the Bill is to improve online safety for children by empowering parents. The Bill has four key provisions, which build on the recommendations of the Independent Parliamentary Inquiry into Online Child Protection, so expertly chaired by Claire Perry MP, and of which I was a member. Clause 1 would require internet service providers—ISPs—and mobile phone operators—MPOs—to provide an internet service free from pornography. Clause 2 requires electronic device manufacturers to provide a means of filtering inappropriate adult internet content at the time of purchase, where the device connects to the internet. Clause 3 requires ISPs and MPOs to provide information about online safety. Finally, Clause 4 requires Ofcom to report on the impact of the legislation every three years.
Right at the heart of the Bill are provisions requiring that ISPs and MPOs provide the option of a pornography-free internet. Those wanting to access pornography will be able to do so, subject to an age verification procedure, demonstrating that they are aged 18 years or over. That an opt-in system is necessary is eloquently demonstrated by Ofcom surveys of parental views demonstrating,
“the perception that parental controls were a fairly complex area, and that choosing and installing them would therefore require a considerable investment of time and effort”.
It is right that the responsibility for bringing up children should be with parents. But they need help and it is surely society's role to help them. We do not allow children to buy R18 films or allow them into cinemas for 18 films and we should not make it easy for them to access pornography online, on purpose or by accident. The industry and Government have a responsibility here and my Bill will, I hope, help them to rise to that challenge.
Of course, I am aware that there are those who will respond to my proposal with a number of criticisms. First, some say that this is censorship. It is patently not censorship. Adults will still be able to access what they are able to access now. This is simply about helping parents to protect their children. The provision may loosely be equated to putting pornography on the top shelf of a corner shop.
Secondly, some say that what is proposed is not technologically possible. I disagree. In terms of filtering, take TalkTalk’s very successful HomeSafe package, AVG's award-winning family safety software, or Olly, which filters out more than 630 million pornographic websites. There is also, most importantly, age verification. The technology behind age verification is key to the Bill’s success. Prior to 2005, there was significant concern about the number of children gambling online. Online gambling companies were especially vocal about that and concerned. Crucially, however, they did nothing really robust to address the problem until they were compelled to introduce age verification via the Gambling Act 2005 to ensure that children could not access remote gambling. Since the law came into force in 2007, children's charities have not been made aware of any significant incidents of children gambling online.
Thirdly, aside from what is technically possible, there are those who would say that this legislation is unlikely to be 100% successful. I want to be very clear that I do not bring this Bill to your Lordships' House naïvely expecting that, if implemented, it would, at all times and in all places, prevent children from accessing pornography. Its purpose is to make the internet safer, and this it can deliver. We do not say that, because a child might find an 18 DVD and, unbeknown to their parents, watch it, that the rating system is useless. We do not say that, because some children might manage to watch something inappropriate after the watershed, the watershed is pointless. Then there are those who ask, “What about the ISPs’ code?”. Of course, in October 2011 the UK’s four largest ISPs—BT, TalkTalk, Virgin Media and Sky—clearly feeling the pressure, announced a new, yet to be properly implemented, voluntary code of practice. That introduced the policy of active choice which will require new customers with these ISPs to decide whether to apply filtering technology.
The ISPs’ voluntary code is certainly a step in the right direction. However, it has a number of significant drawbacks. First, the code will not apply to existing customers and, as customers rarely change their ISP, it will not protect the majority of households. Secondly, the code does not cover all ISPs in the UK. While those four ISPs currently dominate the market, we cannot be sure that that will always be the case. Thirdly, it does not apply to publicly available wi-fi spots. Fourthly, it makes no reference at all to age verification. Fifthly, it is not statutory and, as those of us who are familiar with what happened in relation to online gambling will recall, that is problematic. In fact, the ISPs are significantly behind the MPOs, which introduced their own code of practice as long ago as 2004. That code committed MPOs to place commercial content, classified as 18, behind access controls and make it available only to those customers that it has satisfied itself, through a process of age verification, are 18 or over. However, the latest Ofcom data reported that only three in 10 parents of 12 to 15 year-olds, who use their phones to access the internet, said that the phone blocks websites aimed at those 18 or over, so it seems to me that there is still much room for improvement.
Moreover, as the MPO code is also non-statutory, it permits quite a divergence in practice which means that MPOs apply various forms of parental control rather than the uniform golden standard. The absence of a gold standard can be confusing for customers as they move from provider to provider.
It seems to me that neither the censorship technology definition of success or existing self-regulatory arguments effectively counter the case for my Bill. Before drawing my comments to a close, I would like to make a brief point about the definition of pornography. The term “pornographic images” in the Bill is used in the same way as in Section 63 of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008, where possession of extreme pornographic images was made an offence. Under the 2008 Act an image is pornographic if,
“it is of such a nature that it must reasonably be assumed to have been produced solely or principally for the purpose of sexual arousal”.
We have already defined pornography and we have debated the subject in previous debates so I hope that we will not need to take more time on that today. For the avoidance of doubt, it would mean that web pages that might contain nudity but are not meant for the purpose of arousal, such as medical websites or sex and relationship education websites, would not be blocked. I hope colleagues will agree that that is a wholly reasonable proposal.
Finally, I should say that I am encouraged that the Government have taken some steps this year in relation to the online safety challenge by holding their summer consultation on parental control mechanisms, and an opt-in arrangement was among the proposals recommended. However, the consultation, sadly, made no reference whatever to age verification, without which none of the proposals advanced would be of much use. I would suggest to the Minister that my Bill proposing a statutory opt-in arrangement with statutory age verification, as in the Gambling Act 2005, provides the kind of solution that we need and that would help the Government in their efforts to fulfil their coalition agreement commitment to combat the sexualisation of childhood. I very much hope that the Government and the House will support the Bill. I beg to move.
Baroness Howe of Idlicote
My Lords, I have to admit that I am slightly bewildered. I very warmly thank everyone who has taken part in the debate and all noble Lords who have joined in the questioning to try to make clearer exactly what the Government’s position is. I was enormously pleased to receive a huge number of letters in support of this approach, including from colleagues who, sadly, could not be with us today. I am thinking particularly of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, and the noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, but there were many others. The contributions from all around the House, from not only those who support the Bill but also those who had some queries about it, represented an amazing range of views and perspectives, all focusing on the vital need to keep children safe online. That is the Minister’s stated aim and the idea of an agreed line of 18—that certain areas should not be available to children under the age of 18—is a very important beginning.
We are seeking the best way of going forward, which includes, of course, an emphasis on parental education. It is important to remember that Clause 1 deals with pornography, Clause 2 with all adult content—that is important—and Clause 3 with education. The education side is vital too. I still find it rather peculiar—the Minister may be able to answer this at some stage, maybe, as he rightly says, in Committee—that the Government consulted on opting in if they are against that form of process.
I will return to details from the contributions that have been made. My noble friend Lord Swinfen made an excellent speech on why the opt-in system does not constitute censorship, while the noble Baroness, Lady Masham, highlighted the centrality of better education, a theme that very much came out in speeches by other noble Lords. The personal experience of the noble Baroness, Lady Dean, of an opt-in system in a different way illustrated what a useful method this could be. I thank her and other noble Lords, including my colleagues on this Bench, for their contributions. I still hope that the Government will be able to explain their position, perhaps before Committee stage. It is such an important point.
Going back for a moment to the point about pornography, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich asked a very important question. The definition of a pornographic image was set out in the Act that I referred to. I gave the quote in order to follow through and define what “violent and degrading pornography” actually is. There is a better definition further on that can be referred to.
I am enormously grateful to the Children’s Society, which the noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, mentioned in her excellent speech, and which has been a great help. It is so involved in this issue and knows more about it than any noble Lord or even the Government. Its experience is very much to the fore. I also pay tribute to CARE, which has been an enormous help in providing me and colleagues with all sorts of valuable information to move this whole issue on.
I hope we may come to a better understanding. I thank again all noble Lords who have taken part in the debate, whatever their views, and end by asking the House to give the Bill a Second Reading.