Online Safety Bill

Baroness Stowell of Beeston Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 10th July 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Allan of Hallam (LD)]

That point is well made. In support of that, if the public space treated me in a discriminatory way, I would expect to have redress, but I do not think I have a right in every public space to say everything I like in the classic Article 8 sense. My right vis-à-vis the state is much broader than my right vis-à-vis any public space that I am operating in where norms apply as well as my basic legal rights. Again, to take the pub example, if I went in and made a racist speech, I may well be thrown out of the pub even though it is sub-criminal and the police are never called; they do not need to be as the space itself organises it.

I am making the point that terms of service are about managing these privately managed public services, and it would be a mistake to equate them entirely with our right to speak or the point at which the state can step in and censor us. I understand the point about state interference but it cuts both ways: both the state interfering in excessively censoring what we can say but also the state potentially interfering in the management of what is, after all, a private space. To refer back to the US first amendment tradition, a lot of that was about freedom of religion and precisely about enabling heterodoxy. The US did not want an orthodoxy in which one set of rules applied everywhere to everybody. Rather, it wanted people to have the right to dissent, including in ways that were exclusive. You could create your own religious sect and you could not be told not to have those beliefs.

Rolling that power over to the online world, online services, as long as they are non-discriminatory, can have quite different characters. Some will be very restrictive of speech like a restrictive religious sect; some will be very open and catholic, with a small “c”, in the sense of permitting a broad range of speech. I worry about some of the amendments in case there is a suggestion that Ofcom would start to tell a heterodox community of online services that there is an orthodox way to run their terms of service; I would rather allow this to be a more diverse environment.

Having expressed some concerns, I am though very sympathetic to Amendment 162 on Section 5 of the Public Order Act. I have tried in our debates to bring some real experience to this. There are two major concerns about the inclusion of the Public Order Act in the Bill. One is a lack of understanding of what that means. If you look at the face of the language that has been quoted at us, and go back to that small service that does not have a bunch of lawyers on tap, it reads as though it is stopping any kind of abusive content. Maybe you will google it, as I did earlier, and get a little thing back from the West Yorkshire Police. I googled: “Is it illegal to swear in the street?”. West Yorkshire Police said, “Yes, it is”. So if you are sitting somewhere googling to find out what this Public Order Act thing means, you mind end up thinking, “Crikey, for UK users, I have to stop them swearing”. There is a real risk of misinterpretation.

The second risk is that of people deliberately gaming the system; again, I have a real-life example from working in one of the platforms. I had people from United Kingdom law enforcement asking us to remove content that was about demonstrations by far-right groups. They were groups I fundamentally disagree with, but their demonstrations did not appear to be illegal. The grounds cited were that, if you allow this content to go ahead and the demonstration happens, there will be a Public Order Act offence. Once you get that on official notepaper, you have to be quite robust to say, “No, I disagree”, which we did on occasion.

I think there will be other services that receive Public Order Act letters from people who seem official and they will be tempted to take down content that is entirely legal. The critical thing here is that that content will often be political. In other parts of the Bill, we are saying that we should protect political speech, yet we have a loophole here that risks that.

I am sure the Minister will not concede these amendments, but I hope he will concede that it is important that platforms are given guidance so that they do not think that somebody getting upset about a political demonstration is sufficient grounds to remove the content as a Public Order Act offence. If you are a local police officer it is much better to get rid of that EDL demonstration, so you write to the platform and it makes your life easier, but I do not think that would be great from a speech point of view.

Finally, I turn to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, on Amendment 188 about the ECHR Article 8 exemption. As I read it, if your terms of service are not consistent with ECHR Article 8—and I do not think they will be for most platforms—you then get an exemption from all the other duties around appeals and enforcing them correctly. It is probably a probing amendment but it is a curious way of framing it; it essentially says that, if you are more restrictive, you get more freedom in terms of the Ofcom relationship. I am just curious about the detail of that amendment.

It is important that we have this debate and understand this relationship between the state, platforms and terms of service. I for one am persuaded that the general framework of the Bill makes sense; there are necessary and proportionate restrictions. I am strongly of the view that platforms should be allowed to be heterodox in their terms of service. Ofcom’s job is very much to make sure that they are done correctly but not to interfere with the content of those terms of service beyond that which is illegal. I am persuaded that we need to be extraordinarily careful about including Public Order Act offences; that particular amendment needs a good hearing.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, I have said several times when we have been debating this Bill—and I will probably say it again when we get to the group about powers—that, for me, the point of the Online Safety Bill is to address the absence of accountability for the extraordinary power that the platforms and search engines have over what we see online and, indeed, how we live and engage with each other online. Through this Bill, much greater responsibility for child safety will be placed on the platforms. That is a good thing; I have been very supportive of the measures to ensure that there are strong protections for children online.

The platforms will also have responsibility, though, for some measures to help adults protect themselves. We must not forget that, the more responsibility that platforms have to protect, the more power we could inadvertently give them to influence what is an acceptable opinion to hold, or to shape society to such an extent that they can even start to influence what we believe to be right or wrong—we are talking about that significant amount of power.

I was of the camp that was pleased when the Government removed the legal but harmful aspects of the Bill, because for me they represented a serious risk to freedom of expression. As I just described, I felt that they risked too much inadvertent power, as it were, going to the platforms. But, with the Government having done that, we have seen through the passage of the Bill some push-back, which is perfectly legitimate and understandable—I am not criticising anyone—from those who were concerned about that move. In response to that, the Government amended the Bill to provide assurances and clarifications on things like the user-empowerment tools. As I said, I do not have any problem; although I might not necessarily support some of the specific measures that were brought forward, I am okay with that as a matter of principle.

However, as was explained by my noble friend Lord Moylan and the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, there has not been a similar willingness from the Government to reassure those who remain concerned about the platforms’ power over freedom of expression. We have to bear in mind that some people’s concerns in this quarter remained even when the legal but harmful change was made—that is, the removal of legal but harmful was a positive step, but it did not go far enough for some people with concerns about freedom of expression.

I am sympathetic to the feeling behind this group, which was expressed by my noble friend and the noble Baroness, Lady Fox. I am sympathetic to many of the amendments. As the noble Lord, Lord Allan of Hallam, pointed out, specifically Amendment 162 in relation to the Public Order Act seems worthy of further consideration by the Government. But the amendments in the group that caught my attention place a specific duty on Ofcom in regard to freedom of expression when drawing up or amending codes of practice or other guidance—these amendments are in my noble friend Lord Moylan’s name. When I looked at them, I did not think that they undermined anything else that the Government brought forward through the amendments to the Bill, as he said, but I thought that they would go a long way towards enforcing the importance of freedom of expression as part of this regulatory framework—one that we expect Ofcom to attach serious importance to.

I take on board what the noble Lord, Lord Allan, said about the framework of this legislation being primarily about safeguarding and protection. The purpose of the Bill is not to enhance freedom of expression, but, throughout its passage, that has none the less always been a concern. It is right that the Government seek to balance these two competing fundamental principles. I ask whether more can be done—my noble friend pointed to the recommendations of the Equality and Human Rights Commission and how they reinforce some of what he proposed. I would like to think that my noble friend the Minister could give some greater thought to this.

As was said, it is to the Government’s credit how much they have moved on the Bill during its passage, particularly between Committee and Report. That was quite contrary to the sense that I think a lot of us felt during the early stages of our debates. It would be a shame if, once the Bill leaves the House, it is felt that the balance is not as fine—let me put it like that—as some people feel it needs to be. I just wanted to express some support and ask my noble friend the Minister to give this proper and serious consideration.

Creative Industries (Communications and Digital Committee Report)

Baroness Stowell of Beeston Excerpts

Friday 7th July 2023 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

That this House takes note of the Report from the Communications and Digital Committee At risk: our creative future (2nd Report, HL Paper 125).

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, it is a privilege and a pleasure to chair the Communications and Digital Committee and to introduce this debate. I am delighted that many of my fellow committee members, both current and former colleagues, will contribute to this debate on our creative industries report, published in January. I make special mention of the noble Baroness, Lady Featherstone, who is not here today as she is still recovering from an injury—I know that she would be here if she could. She was a strong advocate for our inquiry.

Before I go any further, I pay tribute to the excellent team that advises and supports us; indeed, it deserves a huge amount of credit not just for its hard work but for the quality of our work. It is led by our exceptional committee clerk Dan Schlappa, and we are also ably and professionally supported by our policy analyst Emily Bailey Page, Owen Williams from the Press Office, Rita Cohen—one of the best and most reliable administrators I have ever come across—and Soham Karwa, a second year PhD student temporarily on attachment to the committee from Imperial College. On the committee itself, we are lucky to have such a diverse array of knowledge and expertise from across the media, digital and creative sectors. I thank all members for their dedication and contribution to our collective effort.

Some noble Lords may remember that, as part of our inquiry, we took evidence from Ai-Da, the robot artist. The House will be pleased to know that she is not here today to accompany proceedings, but the release of ChatGPT in the time since we had to reboot her during her evidence shows just how fast technology is moving and why we need a coherent strategy to ensure that the creative sector keeps pace and can thrive in the modern world.

This debate is timely, coming shortly after the publication by the Government of the Creative Industries Sector Vision, which my committee has been calling for. I was pleased to see that it recognised and directly addressed many of the key concerns we raised in our report, which I will come to later.

First, let me clarify what we are talking about and why it matters. The creative industries are an economic powerhouse, generating £108 billion a year and employing over 2.3 million people. Between 2011 and 2019, job growth in the creative industries was three times that in the UK overall. This job market offers a range of rewarding roles, with many vocational entry routes. Clusters of creative businesses are located across the country, which supports levelling up. Creative sector businesses are addressing net-zero challenges by driving innovation in concept design and material sciences.

Much of the growth potential lies in areas that combine technology with creativity, and the UK has particular strengths here. Our gaming market is worth £7 billion alone, and our animation market is world-renowned. A record £5.6 billion was spent on film and high-end television production in the UK in 2021. The number of UK firms working on immersive technologies rose by over 80% between 2016 and 2021.

The UK has long been regarded as a global leader in both the privately funded and the publicly funded creative sectors, and rightly so. But international competition is hotting up. In the last 10 years, the global value of exports of creative services has more than doubled to reach $1.1 trillion. Countries across the world are seeking a greater slice of this lucrative industry. Let me explain how. Many of the things that made the UK successful—like fiscal incentives, public arts programmes, centres of excellence and high-end production centres—are being copied and improved on by Governments abroad. At the same time, small UK businesses are selling up and, with them, valuable intellectual property is moving overseas.

UK experts are being left out of leading international research collaborations, which leaves us less influential and less engaged at the cutting edge of innovation. Huge American tech giants are dominating the emerging market in virtual and augmented reality, and they are reaping huge dividends from all of the consumer data that this generates. Also, technological advances and disruption risk shifting people out of the creative workforce and, in the process, reducing the vibrancy and creative spark on which so much of our economic success depends. In short, we face mounting challenges and cannot take the continued success of our creative industries for granted.

When we published our report, we had major concerns about how seriously the Government were taking this sector and the challenges it faces. Political attention had waned in recent years, I regret to say. The sector scarcely featured in the Chancellor’s 2022 Autumn Statement and was not among his key growth industries. International summits were being skipped by Ministers, and industry experts had started to speak openly about the UK’s decline in a fast-moving and highly competitive global market.

We also had concerns about what seemed to be an incoherent policy landscape holding the sector back. UKRI, the national funding agency for investing in research and innovation, was proposing to cut the creative industries clusters programme, which had delivered unprecedented success and return on investment. The Intellectual Property Office was proposing a new text and data mining regime that would undercut creative sector business models. To be blunt, Whitehall was blindly favouring new technology at the expense of creative IP. Efforts to tackle skills were not aligned with industry needs, and support for organisations receiving public funding placed too little emphasis on the innovation, cross-sector collaboration and sustainability that are key to ensuring the arts sector’s long-term success.

It is vital to stress that championing the creative industries is not a matter of special pleading. There is a serious and well-evidenced business case for the sector to sit at the heart of the UK’s future growth plans.

Perhaps I may at this point direct a comment to the creative sector itself. The emphasis from some who work within it on how it is “special” and should not be dirtied by talk of money, efficiencies and the value it adds to the economy has not always helped its cause and I would argue to those who maintain that position that it does need to change.

Given the importance of the sector, I was very pleased to see the new sector vision, which is a collaboration between government and the creative industries and sets out plans and commitments to help the creative sector fulfil its potential. While, of course, it is not perfect, it addresses some of the core issues we raised.

First, the new level of political attention is notable. The Chancellor has now included the creative industries in the UK’s priority economic growth areas. The sector vision has a foreword from the Prime Minister. These changes matter, and industry will be paying attention. I believe this recognition at the very top of government has not happened by accident.

Second is the new £50 million of funding being provided to continue the creative clusters programme. This will build on the hugely successful previous round of clusters, which exceeded expectations and provided a proven model for stimulating innovation and generating significant returns on investment. I must emphasise, however, that while this investment is welcome, UKRI and the Government must ensure that the value generated by previous clusters is not lost; they must be supported to transition to a long-term, sustainable footing. One practice that we saw quite commonly across the policy areas relevant to the creative industries was what I might describe as a bit of “initiative-itis”: instead of sticking with what is proven to have worked, trying to reinvent things and start again from scratch.

The additional £75 million investment in the CoSTAR programme to boost R&D is also welcome, and speaks to the fact that the nexus between technology and creativity is a core UK strength that we should double down on.

Thirdly, the Government’s commitment to dropping the proposed text and data mining regime is crucial. I understand that the Intellectual Property Office is now working on a new voluntary code. My committee will keep a close eye on how that develops, because creative businesses, whether they are in the music industry, publishers, artists—all of them—remain very concerned about getting this right. As we emphasised in our report, developing AI is important—indeed, we have announced today that our next inquiry is on AI—but it should not be pursued at all costs. Otherwise, we will find that things we value and make us distinctive as a country gradually disappear in the name of efficiency and technological progress.

The previous proposals, which have now been scratched, threw creative sector businesses under the bus, and needlessly so. The trade-off does not need to happen in this way: many sectors marry technology and creativity very well, and generate huge profits in the process, without undermining IP and business models. A fair deal that promotes innovation and supports the creative sector is possible, and we look forward to seeing the IPO’s plans in due course.

Fourthly, the Government have committed to using a data-driven approach to mapping skills requirements in the sector, which will make use of the new Unit for Future Skills. This too is vital. There are thousands of training courses and initiatives, yet far too many employers say that skills shortages are getting worse and that the Government do not have a good enough plan to address this. The first step is to set out exactly where the most acute shortages are. The Government must ensure that this then informs policy decisions around the development of apprenticeships and T-levels, and the provision, funding and advertisement of lifelong learning courses.

On the subject of skills, I will reiterate the committee’s recommendation that innovative ideas, such as the flexi-job apprenticeship, should be scaled up to address a pressing problem: namely, that apprenticeships should be an excellent route into the sector, but many of them are poorly suited to the industry’s work practices and SME-dominated set-up. The Government have committed to ministerial round tables to discuss creative apprenticeships and say that they will “improve” the flexi-job model. I would be grateful for further clarification from my noble friend about what specific changes and improvements are planned, and the timeline for delivering them.

Fifthly, we called for better support for SMEs to boost growth. I was pleased to see that the Create Growth Programme is receiving a funding uplift. It will be important to review the most successful outcomes of this programme and help scale learnings more widely across the country. There are other welcome commitments around delivering national plans for cultural and music education, joining up the creative sector with public health, and awareness of how the sector relates to environmental targets.

I cannot claim that the sector vision addresses all the committee’s concerns. The UK’s definition of R&D for tax relief, for example, is an outlier compared with other OECD countries. It remains overly restrictive and excludes a large proportion of work in the creative sector. As one business owner told us, it can mean that technical staff are able to claim R&D relief but the key creative contributors working on the same project cannot. As a result, the whole team’s ability to innovate is limited by the number of creatives the company can afford to employ.

I appreciate of course that we cannot distribute endless tax cuts, but we can double down on our strengths and at least explore further options for stimulating more innovation. I reiterate the committee’s call for the Government to look at this issue more seriously by expanding the definition of R&D. A limited pilot could be a good start.

I would also welcome more clarity on what is happening with careers guidance. The committee’s inquiry heard evidence that guidance is patchy and needed significant improvements. This is vital to getting young people into the right courses and jobs, and filling extensive skills gaps. The sector vision refers to “inspiring creative careers guidance”, but does not say much about what that actually means. Perhaps it will be addressed in the forthcoming education plans; I would certainly welcome clarification from my noble friend if he can give that today.

Finally, we also need a solid plan for dealing with technological disruption. Technologies are moving at breakneck speed—to state the obvious. We cannot simply wish them away or pretend that they will not have significant disruption, particularly for people who have roles with insecure contracts and work in areas of the creative industries that are more exposed. The Government are not there to back up everyone’s business models, but they can create the conditions and planning to help UK businesses prepare and adapt. Supporting businesses and freelancers to be more resilient, dynamic and flexible will stand them in good stead to manage the looming changes facing the sector.

Other countries will doubtless be looking at this, and the UK must not be left behind. I look forward to seeing the Government’s response to the Creative Industries Policy and Evidence Centre’s report on working practices and hope that it will address, in further detail, concerns about helping businesses and freelancers understand and manage the impacts of technological disruption.

This sector vision is very much the start, not the end, of a process. We must not be lulled into a false sense of security: publishing a plan does not mean that it will automatically be successful, or indeed that other countries will not similarly publish ambitious plans which see the UK fall behind. Continued high-level political commitment will remain crucial. As I said at the beginning, our creative industries are critically important to our national life and economy. They help us to unite and generate our collective pride in being British and to promote the best of British around the world. They do not deserve special treatment or exceptions from the basic demands placed on all businesses and organisations which are necessary for their survival, but we need to make sure that the right policy frameworks are in place and that we take them seriously. In the end, their continued success will be down to the creative industries themselves and the very many talented people who work within them.

There is much more ground that I could cover, but I am sure that it will be picked up by other noble Lords in the debate, which I look forward to hearing. I beg to move.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the Minister for that very comprehensive response to this debate, which has covered a huge amount of ground. I join my noble friend Lord Vaizey in paying great compliments to him as a tremendous Arts Minister. I do not know whether he is as good or better than the last Arts Minister—who is also with us in the Chamber today—but we are very grateful to have him in that post. I am also very grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate today, for the very generous comments that have been made in my direction, to the committee as a whole and to those who support us in our work.

I will offer some concluding comments. It is probably worth me saying something which I did not say at the beginning, which is that the underlying premise of our inquiry was about identifying the risks and opportunities of technology as it impacted on the creative industries. Even with that framework, there was clearly a huge amount of ground to cover.

The noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, expressed an interest in my comments about how some of the creative industry leaders or high-profile figures might change if they are to be taken more seriously. One of the things I would say in response to that is that through doing this inquiry, I now really believe and understand the economic value of the creative sector. I have always known it was important, but I did not see it in those terms before. That has shifted my whole perspective on it. It might be worth sharing that when I was a teenager and had just moved to London, I went back home and told my dad I had met somebody who described themselves as “a creative” when I asked them what they did for a living. My dad’s response was, “Well, that sounds like a good excuse for doing nothing”. Now he was a brilliant painter and decorator—the best in the area—but he was also somebody who was good at art and is quite creative. The reason why I think this is important is that there has always been something of a separation in the way people perceive creativity: as something which is important but not necessarily a powerful driving force of our economy.

Technology has now given the creative industries the opportunity to show that they are part of the economic powerhouse, as has already been said. Our report calls for the creative industries to grasp that opportunity, and to make sure that they are not overpowered by technology or deprioritised because of it. We have seen and discussed this threat today, in particular in the context of IP. They should not be afraid to use it and grasp it. Those parts of the creative industries whose underlying purpose may not be commercial should use the overall commercial opportunity of the sector that they are a part of as a way of capitalising on their importance and contributing to something that is bigger than themselves.

One of the main areas of policy that was raised in the course of everybody’s contributions was skills and education. I again urge the Government and the creative industries, when they look at and consider this topic, to work even harder at gaining some mutual understanding in this area. As has been commented on, our report refers to what we described as:

“Lazy rhetoric about ‘low value’ arts courses”,


which risks deterring people from pursuing an education and career in the creative sector. The point we were trying to make is that, although we share the Government’s concern about some degree courses not representing value for money or value to anybody specifically, they should not, in highlighting them, group everything in that category.

It is important for the creative industries to be grown-up and realistic in the way they talk about that too. It was compelling to hear one of our witnesses during our inquiry, Seetha Kumar from ScreenSkills, make the point that a lot of people go to university to study skills and get degrees when that was not the best way for them to get into the creative industries. There were much better routes to do that, and that organisation wanted to create and support more of those opportunities. It was refreshing to hear somebody from the creative industries say that honestly in the course of our evidence.

As has been said, it is important that the sector vision identifies the fusion of creative and STEM skills as an important part of the future. There has to be a lot more collaboration and understanding by the Government as to what is needed from the creative sector. I also urge the creative sector to get better at being specific about what it needs and wants to see changed. If it can be specific, the Government will have a much better opportunity to respond to those needs.

Overall, the debate has shown the importance that all of us collectively attach to our creative industries. Long may they continue. We want to see them thrive and for everybody to have a good opportunity to be a part of them.

Motion agreed.

Online Safety Bill

Baroness Stowell of Beeston Excerpts

Report stage
Thursday 6th July 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Oxford]

My Lords, I broadly support all the amendments in this group but I will focus on the three amendments in the names of the noble Lord, Lord Russell, and others; I am grateful for their clear exposition of why these amendments are important. I draw particular attention to Amendment 281A and its helpful list of functions that are considered to be harmful and to encourage addiction.

There is a very important dimension to this Bill, whose object, as we have now established, is to encourage safety by design. An important aspect of it is cleaning up, and setting right, 20 years or more of tech development that has not been safe by design and has in fact been found to be harmful by way of design. As the noble Baroness, Lady Harding, just said, in many conversations and in talking to people about the Bill, one of the hardest things to communicate and get across is that this is about not only content but functionality. Amendment 281A provides a useful summary of the things that we know about in terms of the functions that cause harm. I add my voice to those encouraging the Minister and the Government to take careful note of it and to capture this list in the text of the Bill in some way so that this clean-up operation can be about not only content for the future but functionality and can underline the objectives that we have set for the Bill this afternoon.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, I start by saying amen—not to the right reverend Prelate but to my noble friend Lady Harding. She said that we should not assume that, just because charities exist, they are all doing good; as a former chair of the Charity Commission, I can say that that is very true.

The sponsors of Amendments 281 to 281B have made some powerful arguments in support of them. They are not why I decided to speak briefly on this group but, none the less, they made some strong points.

I come back to Amendments 28 to 30. Like others, I do not have a particular preference for which of the solutions is proposed to address this problem but I have been very much persuaded by the various correspondence that I have received—I am sure that other noble Lords have received such correspondence—which often uses Wikipedia as the example to illustrate the problem.

However, I take on board what my noble friend said: there is a danger of identifying one organisation and getting so constrained by it that we do not address the fundamental problems that the Bill is about, which is making sure that there is a way of appropriately excluding organisations that should not be subject to these various regulations because they are not designed for them. I am open to the best way of doing that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Allan of Hallam (LD)]

On the noble Baroness’s point, that is why I intervened in the debate: so that we are all clear. We are not saying that, for priority content, it is an amber light and not a red light. We are not saying, “Just remove all this stuff”; it would be a wrong response to the Bill to say, “It’s a fictional character being slaughtered so remove it”, because now we have removed “Twilight”, “Watership Down” and whatever else. We are saying, “Think very carefully”. If it is one of those circumstances where this is causing harm—they exist; we cannot pretend that they do not—it should be removed. However, the default should not be to remove everything on this list; that is the point I am really trying to make.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, our debate on this group is on the topic of priority harms to children. It is not one that I have engaged in so I tread carefully. One reason why I have not engaged in this debate is because I have left it to people who know far more about it than I do; I have concentrated on other parts of the Bill.

In the context of this debate, one thing has come up on which I feel moved to make a short contribution: misinformation and disinformation content. There was an exchange between my noble friend Lady Harding and the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, on this issue. Because I have not engaged on the topic of priority harms, I genuinely do not have a position on what should and should not be featured. I would not want anybody to take what I say as support for or opposition to any of these amendments. However, it is important for us to acknowledge that, as much as misinformation and disinformation are critical issues—particularly for children and young people because, as the right reverend Prelate said, the truth matters—we cannot, in my view, ignore the fact that misinformation and disinformation have become quite political concepts. They get used in a way where people often define things that they do not agree with as misinformation—that is, opinions are becoming categorised as misinformation.

We are now putting this in legislation and it is having an impact on content, so it is important, too, that we do not just dismiss that kind of concern as not relevant because it is real. That is all I wanted to say.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak briefly as I know that we are waiting for a Statement.

If you talk to colleagues who know a great deal about the harm that is happening and the way in which platforms operate, as well as to colleagues who talk directly to the platforms, one thing that you commonly hear from them is a phrase that often recurs when they talk to senior people about some of the problems here: “I never thought of that before”. That is whether it is about favourites on Snapchat, which cause grief in friendship groups, about the fact that, when somebody leaves a WhatsApp group, it flags up who that person is—who wants to be seen as the person who took the decision to leave?—or about the fact that a child is recommended to other children even if the company does not know whether they are remotely similar.

If you are 13, you are introduced as a boy to Andrew Tate; if you are a girl, you might be introduced to a set of girls who may or may not share anorexia content, but they dog-whistle and blog. The companies are not deliberately orchestrating these outcomes—it is the way they are designed that is causing those consequences—but, at the moment, they take no responsibility for what is happening. We need to reflect on that.

I turn briefly to a meeting that the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, and I were at yesterday afternoon, which leads neatly on to some of the comments the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, made, a few moments ago about the far right. The meeting was convened by Luke Pollard MP and was on the strange world known as the manosphere, which is the world of incels—involuntary celibates. As your Lordships may be aware, on various occasions, certain individuals who identify as that have committed murder and other crimes. It is a very strange world.

Online Safety Bill

Baroness Stowell of Beeston Excerpts

Thursday 25th May 2023 Lords Chamber

It seems that this difficulty, again, goes back to the debate we had previously on the need for some form of complaints system, whereby people can report easily to a complaints system and have confidence in that complaint being collated with other similar complaints, which would then allow action to be taken.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, I welcome government Amendment 135A and the inclusion in the Bill of the new offence of cyberflashing.

I understand why questions have been raised, and indeed arguments advanced, about the way in which this offence has been crafted and whether the onus should be on the perpetrator or the victim of such a crime. I tend to come down on the side of the Law Commission and what is in the Bill as it stands. I have thought about it, and I have listened carefully and read the various briefings. I have weighed it up and found it quite hard at times to make my mind up. On balance. I would stick with what is in the Bill.

The noble Baroness, Lady Burt, said something I am not sure is correct. She said that, in the way it is currently included in the Bill, it will be the responsibility of women and girls to show that they are harmed by this. My understanding is that the opposite of that is true; they just need to report it and the responsibility sits on the shoulders of the person distributing these images. I am sure my noble friend the Minister will be able to confirm that—or otherwise—when he comes to wind up.

The only other thing in that context which I will add—I think this has been touched on by others—is that it is important, in introducing this as a new offence, that we ensure that we educate young people away from what I have been told has now become quite a common practice as a way of expressing interest in one another. I do not think that, just because it is happening, we should tolerate it and say, “Okay, well that’s all right then”. I do not think that it is right, and we should be much clearer about advising and explaining to our young people why that is not the best way to express any kind of interest in anyone, whether they are of the opposite sex or of the same sex. I also understand this is a common practice among gay men as well. I just think that taking photographs of one’s genitals and distributing them to other people is not a good idea—that is my argument.

My noble friend Lady Berridge’s Amendment 271 is an interesting proposal. What I found compelling about it was her argument that we will introduce a new offence in the Bill, and, specifically in that context, she proposes a way to report receiving these pictures when people do not want to receive them, and to do so in a way that makes it easier for the police to see new trends and incidences emerging. It is then more likely that they would be able to pursue a perpetrator. However, although I hope my noble friend the Minister will consider this carefully, I do not know what the tech companies would argue about their position, having been given that responsibility. So I am interested in her proposal and think that it is worth proper consideration, but I say that without the benefit of an understanding of where the tech firms are on it. But, overall, I welcome what the Government propose and offer my support.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, alongside others, I very much welcome government Amendment 135A and how the Minister introduced it. But there is a big “but” as regards much of the rest of what he said. I very much welcome that this will be included as a priority offence, and I join other noble Lords in that—but there is still a view out there that women and girls are being short-changed by the Bill. The other day, we had a debate on the Violence Against Women and Girls Code of Practice, and the same feeling about the cyberflashing offence was very much there, which is why I strongly support Amendments 269 and 270, which would alter the nature of Clause 167.

The equivalence between online and offline was mentioned by my noble friend Lady Burt—I also regret that my noble friend Lady Featherstone has not been with us for some time—and she introduced extremely clearly and well that this kind of cyberflashing offence leads to other and worse offences in both the offline and the online worlds, as we have seen.

Like others, I am in debt to Professor McGlynn for her analysis of the proposed offence. We had evidence from UCL and the Bumble survey, and there is of course also the YouGov survey that shows that nearly half of young women aged 18 to 24 have been sent an unwanted penis image—that is an extraordinary figure. So all of the evidence of this offence is there.

We have heard differing views on the offence—the noble Baronesses, Lady Berridge and Lady Stowell, are on the side of the status quo on the nature of the offence. The fact is that the Government’s proposal covers only some cases of cyberflashing, where motivated by a desire to cause “distress” or for “sexual gratification” with recklessness about causing distress.

I am not a criminal lawyer, but, in answer to the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, you have to show intent beyond reasonable doubt—that is where the onus on the victim arises. There is a very high barrier in a criminal offence. My noble friend made that point clearly, and the analysis of the noble Baroness, Lady Gohir, was absolutely right that, of course, if you make it a criminal offence, where the issue is about consent rather than intent, you can always be more lenient when an offence does not seem so egregious, where there is clear misunderstanding or where there are other mitigating factors—that is what happens under the criminal law.

This is all about proving the motive—that is the real problem; it is technically called mens rea or the intent—so we need a clear message, as my noble friend said. I believe that we are squandering an opportunity here; it could be a real opportunity for the Government to send a much more powerful signal that the Bill is about protecting women and girls, despite the very welcome addition of abuse under Amendment 135A.

The noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, put her point extremely well. She made a very good case for another addition to the armoury of user-empowerment tools. Although I disagree with her about the ambit of the cyberflashing offence, she proposed something which would be extremely useful to add.

We ought to take heed from the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, given her legal background. She referred to the Law Commission’s rather inconsistent approach. The very welcome proposal to extend the way that revenge porn events will apply seems to be extremely sensible. I am afraid that, in the battle of the professors, I prefer what Professor McGlynn is saying to what Professor Lewis is saying; that is the choice that I have made.

Following the way that the noble Baroness, Lady Gohir, talked about this issue, we need to call men to account. That is something that the Government need to pay heed to.

That is all I want to say on this subject. This is not just a technical aspect—it is not just a question of whether or not we accept the Law Commission’s advice in this particular case—it is about the difficulty that young women, in particular, will find in enforcing this offence, and we need to be very mindful of that.

Online Safety Bill

Baroness Stowell of Beeston Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 23rd May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Allan of Hallam (LD)]

My Lords, I support Amendment 227 in particular. I am pleased to contribute, as someone who gave evidence to the Leveson inquiry, explaining why social media should not be in scope for any new press regulation scheme. It is entertaining for me now to come through the looking glass and listen to the noble Lords, Lord Black of Brentwood and Lord Faulks, in particular making the kinds of argument I made then, as we discuss whether the press should be in scope for a new social media regulatory scheme.

These amendments are a helpful way to test how the Government expect their decision to afford certain privileges for online activity by journalists and news publishers to work. That is what the regime does, in effect, with the rationale, which was explained to us, that this is why certain bodies can be privileged when using user-to-user services and search engines in a way that, if they were not afforded that status, they would not be given those privileges. Again, it is noteworthy that there has often been criticism of social media precisely for giving special treatment to some users, including in stories in some of the press that we are talking about, and here we are creating not just a state sanction but a state-ordered two-tier system that all the social media companies will now have to adopt. That creates some interesting questions in itself.

I want to press the Minister primarily on definitions. It is certainly my experience that definitions of who is a journalist or a news media publisher are challenging and can be highly political. There have been several pressure points, pushing social media companies to try to define journalists and news publishers for themselves, outside of any regulatory scheme—notably following the disputes about misinformation and disinformation in the United States. The European Union also has a code of practice on misinformation and disinformation. Every time someone approaches this subject, they ask social media companies to try to distinguish journalists and news media from other publishers. So these efforts have been going on for some time, and many of them have run into disputes because there is no consistent agreement about who should be in or outside those regimes. This is one of those problems that seems clear and obvious when you stand back from it, but the more that you zoom in, the more complex and messy it becomes. We all say, “Oh yes, journalists and news publishers—that is fine”, and we write that in the legislation, but, in practice, it will be really hard when people have to make decisions about individuals.

Some news organisations are certainly highly problematic. Most terrorist organisations have news outlets and news agencies. They do not advertise themselves as such but, if you work in a social media platform, you have to learn to distinguish them. They are often presented entirely legitimately, and some of the information that you use to understand why they are problematic may be private, which creates all sorts of problems. Arguably, this is the Russia Today situation: it presented itself as legitimate and was registered with Ofcom for a period of time; we accepted that it was a legitimate news publisher, but we changed our view because we regard the Russian Government as a terrorist regime, in some senses. That is happening all of the time, with all sorts of bodies across the world that have created these news organisations. In the Middle East in particular, you have to be extraordinarily careful—you think that something is a news organisation but you then find that it has a Hezbollah connection and, there you go, you have to try to get rid of it. News organisations tied to extremist organisations is one area that is problematic, and my noble friend referred to it already.

There is also an issue with our domestic media environment. Certainly, most people would regard Gary Lineker as a journalist who works for a recognised news publisher—the BBC—but not everyone will agree with that definition. Equally, most people regard the gentleman who calls himself Tommy Robinson as not being a journalist; however much he protests that he is in front of judges and others, and however much support he has from recognised news publishers in the United States, most people would say that he is not a journalist. The community of people who agree that Gary Lineker is not a journalist and that of people who think that Tommy Robinson is not a journalist do not overlap much, but I make the point that there is continually this contention about individuals, and people have views about who should be in or out of any category that we create.

This is extraordinarily difficult, as in the Bill we are tasking online services with a very hard job. In a few lines of it, we say: “Create these special privileges for these people we call journalists and news publishers”. That is going to be really difficult for them to do in practice and they are going to make mistakes, either exclusionary or inclusionary. We are giving Ofcom an incredibly difficult role, which is why this debate is important, because it is going to have to adjudicate when that journalist or news publisher says to Ofcom: “I think this online platform is breaching the Online Safety Act because of the way it treated me”. Ofcom is going to have to take a view about whether that organisation or individual is legitimate. Given the individuals I named, you can bet your bottom dollar that someone is going to go to Ofcom and say, “I don’t think that Gary Lineker or the BBC are legitimate”. That one should be quite easy; others across the spectrum will be much more difficult for it to deal with.

That is the primary logic underlying Amendment 227: we have known unknowns. There will be unanticipated effects of this legislation and, until it is in place and those decisions are being made, we do not know how it will work. Frankly, we do not know whether, as a result of legal trickery and regulatory decisions, we have inadvertently created a loophole where some people will be able to go and win court cases by claiming protections that we did not intend them to have. I disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Black: I do not think Amendment 227 undermines press freedom in any sense at all. All it does is to say: “We have created an Online Safety Bill. We expect it to enhance people’s safety and within it we have some known unknowns. We do not know how this exemption is going to work. Why not ask Ofcom to see if any of those unintended consequences happen?”

I know that we are labouring our way through the Online Safety Bill version 1, so we do not want to think about an online safety Bill version 2, but there will at some point have to be a revision. It is entirely rational and sensible that, having put this meaningful exemption in there—it has been defended, so I am sure that the Government will not want to give it up—the least we can do is to take a long, hard look, without interfering with press freedom, and get Ofcom to ask, “Did we see those unintended consequences? Do we need to look at the definitions again?”

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Allan, has clearly and comprehensively painted a picture of the complex world in which we now live, and I do not think that anybody can disagree with that or deny it. We are in a world which is going to keep evolving; we have talked in lots of other contexts about the pace of change, and so on. However, in recognising all that, what the noble Lord has just described—the need for constant evaluation of whether this regime is working effectively—is a job for Parliament, not for Ofcom. That is where I come back to in starting my response to this group of amendments.

Briefly—in order that we can get to the wind-ups and conclude business for the day—ensuring that recognised news publishers and organisations are not subject to Ofcom or any form of state regulation is a vital principle. I am pleased that the Government have included the safeguards which they have in the legislation, while also making it much harder for the tech platforms to restrict the freedom of recognised news publishers and users’ access to them.

I reiterate that I understand that this is becoming increasingly complicated, but these are important principles. We have to start in the world that we currently understand and know, ensure that we protect those publications which we recognise as trusted news providers now, and do not give way on those principles. As my noble friend Lord Black said, regarding debates about Section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act, there will be an opportunity to re-evaluate that in due course when we come to the media Bill. For what it is worth, my personal view is that I support the Government’s intention to remove it.

Online Safety Bill

Baroness Stowell of Beeston Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 23rd May 2023 Lords Chamber

At heart, I recognise that this is in principle no more than ensuring that the expertise and knowledge of those who have served in an appropriate parliamentary Select Committee are grafted on to the normal affirmative or negative approval mechanisms for secondary legislation, but I also think it opens up a substantial new way of doing what has, on many occasions, been merely a rubber-stamping of what can be rather significant policy changes. It also gives a good opportunity to bring Parliament and parliamentarians into the policy delivery mechanism in what seems to me to be a satisfying way. It makes sense to do this for a complex new regime in a fast-changing technological environment such as the one that the Bill is ushering in, but it might have other applications, particularly consideration of other legislation that is currently in the pipeline. I beg to move.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson. I am grateful to him, the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, and the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, for their support for my amendments, which I will come to in a moment. Before I do, I know that my noble friend Lord Moylan will be very disappointed not to be here for the start of this debate. From the conversation I had with him last week when we were deliberating the Bill, I know that he is detained on committee business away from the House. That is what is keeping him today; I hope he may join us a bit later.

Before I get into the detail of my amendments, I want to take a step back and look at the bigger picture. I remind noble Lords that on the first day in Committee, when we discussed the purpose of the Bill, one of the points I made was that, in my view, the Bill is about increasing big tech’s accountability to the public. For too long, and I am not saying anything that is new or novel here, it has enjoyed power beyond anything that other media organisations have enjoyed—including the broadcasters, which, as we know, have been subject to regulation for a long time now. I say that because, in my mind, the fundamental problem this legislation seeks to address is the lack of accountability of social media and tech platforms to citizens and users for the power and influence they have over our lives and society, as well as their economic impact. The latter will be addressed via the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Bill.

I emphasise “if that is the problem”, because when we talk about this bit of the Bill and the amendments we have tabled, we have started—and I am as guilty of this as anyone else—to frame it very much as if the problem is around the powers for the Secretary of State. In my view, we need to think about why they are not, in the way they are currently proposed, the right solution to the problem that I have outlined.

I do not think what we should be doing, as some of what is proposed in the Bill tends to do, is shift the democratic deficit from big tech to the regulator, although, of course, like all regulators, Ofcom must serve the public interest as a whole, which means taking everyone’s expectations seriously in the way in which it goes about its work.

That kind of analysis of the problem is probably behind some of what the Government are proposing by way of greater powers for the Secretary of State for oversight and direction of the regulator in what is, as we have heard, a novel regulatory space. I think that the problem with some, although not all, of the new powers proposed for the Secretary of State is that they would undermine the independence of Ofcom and therefore dilute the regulator’s authority over the social media and tech platforms, and that is in addition to what the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, has already said, which is that there is a fundamental principle about the independence of media regulators in the western world that we also need to uphold and to which the Government have already subscribed.

If that is the bigger picture, my amendments would redress the balance between the regulator and the Executive, but there remains the vital role of Parliament, which I will come back to in a moment and which the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, has already touched on, because that is where we need to beef up oversight of regulators.

Before I get into the detail, I should also add that my amendments have the full authority of your Lordships’ Communications and Digital Select Committee, which I have the great honour of chairing. In January, we took evidence from my noble friend Minister and his colleague, Paul Scully, and our amendments are the result of their evidence. I have to say that my noble friend on the Front Bench is someone for whom I have huge respect and admiration, but on that day when the Ministers were before us, we found as a committee that the Government’s evidence in respect of the powers that they were proposing for the Secretary of State was not that convincing.

I shall outline the amendments, starting with Amendments 113, 114, and 115. I am grateful to other noble Lords who have signed them, which demonstrates support from around the House. The Bill allows the Secretary of State to direct Ofcom to change its codes of practice on regulating social media firms for reasons of public policy. While it is legitimate for the Government to set strategic direction, this goes further and amounts to direct and unnecessary interference. The Government have suggested clarifying this clause, as we have heard, with a list of issues such as security, foreign policy, economic policy and burden to business, but it is our view as a committee that the list of items is so vague and expansive that almost anything could be included in it. Nor does it recognise the fact that the Government should respect the separation of powers between Executive and regulator in the first place, as I have already described. These amendments would therefore remove the Secretary of State’s power to direct Ofcom for reasons of public policy. Instead, the Secretary of State may write to Ofcom with non-binding observations on issues of security and child safety to which it must have regard. It is worth noting that under Clause 156 the Secretary of State still has powers to direct Ofcom in special circumstances to address threats to public health, safety and security, so the Government will not be left toothless, although I note that the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, is proposing to remove Clause 156. Just to be clear, the committee is not proposing removing Clause 156; that is a place where the noble Lord and I propose different remedies.

Amendments 117 and 118 are about limiting the risk of infinite ping-pong. As part of its implementation work, Ofcom will have to develop codes of practice, but the Government can reject those proposals infinitely if they disagree with them. At the moment that would all happen behind closed doors. In theory, this process could go on for ever, with no parliamentary oversight. The Select Committee and I struggle to understand why the Government see this power as necessary, so our amendments would remove the Secretary of State’s power to issue unlimited directions to Ofcom on a draft code of practice, replacing it with a maximum of two exchanges of letters.

Amendment 120, also supported by the noble Lords I referred to earlier, is closely related to previous amendments. It is designed to improve parliamentary oversight of Ofcom’s draft codes of practice. Given the novel nature of the proposals to regulate the online world, we need to ensure that the Government and Ofcom have the space and flexibility to develop and adapt their proposals accordingly, but there needs to be a role for Parliament in scrutinising that work and being able to hold the Executive and regulator to account where needed. The amendment would ensure that the affirmative procedure, and not the negative procedure currently proposed in the Bill, was used to approve Ofcom’s codes of practice if they had been subject to attempts by the Secretary of State to introduce changes. This amendment is also supported by the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee in its report.

Finally, Amendment 257 would remove paragraph (a) from Clause 157(1). This is closely related to previous amendments regarding the Secretary of State’s powers. The clause currently provides powers to provide wide-ranging guidance to Ofcom about how it carries out its work. This is expansive and poorly defined, and the committee again struggled to see the necessity for it. The Secretary of State already has extensive powers to set strategic priorities for Ofcom, establish expert advisory committees, direct action in special circumstances, direct Ofcom about its codes or just write to it if my amendments are accepted, give guidance to Ofcom about its media literacy work, change definitions, and require Ofcom to review its codes and undertake a comprehensive review of the entire online safety regime. Including yet another power to give unlimited guidance to Ofcom about how it should carry out its work seems unnecessary and intrusive, so this amendment would remove it, by removing paragraph (a) of Clause 157(1).

I hope noble Lords can see that, even after taking account of the amendments that the committee is proposing, the Secretary of State would be left with substantial and suitable powers to discharge their responsibilities properly.

Perhaps I may comment on some of the amendments to which I have not added my name. Amendment 110 from the noble Lords, Lord Stevenson and Lord Clement-Jones, and Amendment 290 from the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, are about parliamentary oversight by Select Committees. I do not support the detail of these amendments nor the procedures proposed, because I believe they are potentially too cumbersome and could cause too much delay to various processes. As I have already said, and as the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, said in opening, the Select Committee and I are concerned to ensure that there is adequate parliamentary oversight of Ofcom as it implements this legislation over the next few years. My committee clearly has a role in this, alongside the new DSIT Select Committee in the House of Commons and perhaps others, but we need to guard against duplication and fragmentation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

When we publish the wording, we will rightly have an opportunity to discuss it before the debate on Report. I will be happy to discuss it with noble Lords then. On the broader points about economic policy, that is a competency of His Majesty’s Government, not an area of focus for Ofcom. If the Government had access to additional information that led them to believe that a code of practice as drafted could have a significant, disproportionate and adverse effect on the livelihoods of the British people or to the broader economy, and if it met the test for exceptional circumstances, taking action via a direction from the Secretary of State could be warranted. I will happily discuss that when my noble friend and others see the wording of the changes we will bring on Report. I am sure we will scrutinise that properly, as we should.

I was about to say that, in addition to the commitment we have already made, in the light of the debate today we will also consider whether transparency about the use of this power could be increased further, while retaining the important need for government oversight of issues that are genuinely beyond Ofcom’s remit. I am conscious that, as my noble friend Lady Stowell politely said, I did not convince her or your Lordships’ committee when I appeared before it with my honourable friend Paul Scully. I am happy to continue our discussions and I hope that we may reach some understanding on this important area.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

I am sorry to interrupt, but may I clarify what my noble friend just said? I think he said that, although he is open to increasing the transparency of the procedure, he does not concede a change—from direction to a letter about guidance which Ofcom should take account of. Is he willing to consider that as well?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Harding of Winscombe (Con)]

My Lords, I also failed to stand up before the noble Lord, Lord Allan, did. I too am always slightly nervous to speak before or after him for fear of not having the detailed knowledge that he does. There have been so many powerful speeches in this group. I will try to speak swiftly.

My role in this amendment was predefined for me by the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, as the midwife. I have spent many hours debating these amendments with my noble friend Lord Bethell, the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, and with many noble Lords who have already spoken in this debate. I think it is very clear from the debate why it is so important to put a definition of age assurance and age verification on the face of the Bill. People feel so passionately about this subject. We are creating the digital legal scaffolding, so being really clear what we mean by the words matters. It really matters and we have seen it mattering even in the course of this debate.

My two friends—they are my friends—the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, and my noble friend Lord Bethell both used the word “proportionate”, with one not wanting us to be proportionate and the other wanting us to be proportionate. Yet, both have their names to the same amendment. I thought it might be helpful to explain what I think they both mean—I am sure they will interrupt me if I get this wrong—and explain why the words of the amendment matter so much.

Age assurance should not be proportionate for pornography. It should be the highest possible bar. We should do everything in our power to stop children seeing it, whether it is on a specific porn site or on any other site. We do not want our children to see pornography; we are all agreed on that. There should not be anything proportionate about that. It should be the highest bar. Whether “beyond reasonable doubt” is the right wording or it should instead be “the highest possible bar practically achievable”, I do not know. I would be very keen to hear my noble friend the Minister’s thoughts on what the right wording is because, surely, we are all clear it should be disproportionate; it should absolutely be the hardest we can take.

Equally, age assurance is not just about pornography, as the noble Lord, Lord Allan, has said. We need to have a proportionate approach. We need a ladder where age assurance for pornography sits at the top, and where we are making sure that nine year-olds cannot access social media sites if they are age-rated for 13. We all know that we can go into any primary school classroom in the land and find that the majority of nine year-olds are on social media. We do not have good age assurance further down.

As both the noble Lord, Lord Allan, and the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, have said, we need age assurance to enable providers to adapt the experience to make it age-appropriate for children on services we want children to use. It needs to be both proportionate and disproportionate, and that needs to be defined on the face of the Bill. If we do not, I fear that we will fall into the trap that the noble Lord, Lord Allan, mentioned: the cookie trap. We will have very well-intentioned work that will not protect children and will go against the very thing that we are all looking for.

In my role as the pragmatic midwife, I implore my noble friend the Minister to hear what we are all saying and to help us between Committee and Report, so that we can come back together with a clear definition of age assurance and age verification on the face of the Bill that we can all support.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, about half an hour ago I decided I would not speak, but as we have now got to this point, I thought I might as well say what I was going to say after all. I reassure noble Lords that in Committee it is perfectly permissible to speak after the winder, so no one is breaking any procedural convention. That said, I will be very brief.

My first purpose in rising is to honour a commitment I made last week when I spoke against the violence against women and girls code. I said that I would none the less be more sympathetic to and supportive of stronger restrictions preventing child access to pornography, so I want to get my support on the record and honour that commitment in this context.

My noble friend Lady Harding spoke on the last group about bringing our previous experiences to bear when contributing to some of these issues. As I may have said in the context of other amendments earlier in Committee, as a former regulator, I know that one of the important guiding principles is to ensure that you regulate for a reason. It is very easy for regulators to have a set of rules. The noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, referred to rules of the road for the tech companies to follow. It is very easy for regulators to examine whether those rules are being followed and, having decided that they have, to say that they have discharged their responsibility. That is not good enough. There must be a result, an outcome from that. As the noble Lord, Lord Allan, emphasised, this must be about outcomes and intended benefits.

I support making it clear in the Bill that, as my noble friend Lady Harding said, we are trying to prevent, disproportionately, children accessing pornography. We will do all we can to ensure that it happens, and that should be because of the rules being in place. Ofcom should be clear on that. However, I also support a proportionate approach to age assurance in all other contexts, as has been described. Therefore, I support the amendments tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, and my noble friend Lord Bethell, and the role my noble friend Lady Harding has played in arriving at a pragmatic solution.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a privilege to be in your Lordships’ House, and on some occasions it all comes together and we experience a series of debates and discussions that we perhaps would never have otherwise reached, and at a level which I doubt could be echoed anywhere else in the world. This is one of those days. We take for granted that every now and again, we get one of these rapturous occasions when everything comes together, but we forget the cost of that. I pay tribute, as others have, to the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron. She has worked so hard on this issue and lots of other issues relating to this Bill and has exhausted herself more times than is right for someone of her still youthful age. I am very pleased that she is going off on holiday and will not be with us for a few days; I wish her well. I am joking slightly, but I mean it sincerely when I say that we have had a very high-quality debate. That it has gone on rather later than the Whips would have wanted is tough, because it has been great to hear and be part of. However, I will be brief.

It was such a good debate that I felt a tension, in that everybody wanted to get in and say what they wanted to say be sure they were on the record. That can sometimes be a disaster, because everyone repeats everything, but as the noble Baroness, Lady Harding, said, we know our roles, we know what to say and when to say it, and it has come together very nicely. Again, we should congratulate ourselves on that. However, we must be careful about something which we keep saying to each other but sometimes do not do. This is a Bill about systems, not content. The more that we get into the content issues, the more difficult it is to remember what the Bill can do and what the regulator will be able to do if we get the Bill to the right place. We must be sure about that.

I want to say just a few things about where we need to go with this. As most noble Lords have said, we need certainty: if we want to protect our children, we have to be able to identify them. We should not be in any doubt about that; there is no doubt that we must do it, whatever it takes. The noble Lord, Lord Allan, is right to say that we are in the midst of an emerging set of technologies, and there will be other things coming down the line. The Bill must keep open to that; it must not be technology-specific, but we must be certain of what this part is about, and it must drill down to that. I come back to the idea of proportionality: we want everybody who is 18 or under to be identifiable as such, and we want to be absolutely clear about that. I like the idea that this should be focused on the phones and other equipment we use; if we can get to that level, it will be a step forward, although I doubt whether we are there yet.

Online Safety Bill

Baroness Stowell of Beeston Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 16th May 2023 Lords Chamber

Of course, the Minister’s conclusion is that there is no need to amend the Bill because we have parliamentary procedure and draft regulations, and because Ofcom will be consulted and so on. That is all fair enough. As the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, said, this is a probing amendment. If we have done something to speed up the process, all well and good, but the essence of this is to get something cracking. I hope that the debate has at least had some impact, but this is still incredibly vague. We do not really know what role is envisaged for the IWF. The Minister has heard around the Committee the regard in which the IWF is held. He has heard our desire to see that it is an integral part of the protection process and the procedures under the Bill, and to see it work with Ofcom.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, I have held back from contributing to this group, because it is not really my group and I have not really engaged in the topic at all. I have been waiting to see whether somebody who is engaged in it would raise this point.

The one factual piece of information that has not been raised in the debate is the fact that the IWF, of which I too am a huge admirer—I have huge respect for the work that it does; it does some fantastic work—is a registered charity. That may lead to some very proper questions about what its role should be in any kind of formal relationship with a statutory regulator. I noticed that no one is proposing in any of these amendments that it be put on the face of the Bill, which, searching back into my previous roles and experience, I think I am right to say would not be proper anyway. But even in the context of whatever role it might have along with Ofcom, I genuinely urge the DCMS and/or Ofcom to ensure that they consult the Charity Commission, not just the IWF, on what is being proposed so that it is compatible with its other legal obligations as a charity.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

If I might follow up that comment, I agree entirely with what the noble Baroness has just said. It is very tricky for an independent charity to have the sort of relationship addressed in some of the language in this debate. Before the Minister completes his comments and sits down again, I ask him: if Ofcom were to negotiate a contracted set of duties with the IWF—indeed, with many other charities or others who are interested in assisting with this important work—could that be done directly by Ofcom, with powers that it already has? I think I am right to say that it would not require parliamentary approval. It is only if we are talking about co-regulation, which again raises other issues, that we would go through a process that requires what sounded like the affirmative procedure—the one that was used, for example, with the Advertising Standards Authority. Is that right?

Online Safety Bill

Baroness Stowell of Beeston Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 16th May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Healy of Primrose Hill (Lab)]

My Lords, I strongly support Amendment 97 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan. We must strengthen the Bill by imposing an obligation on Ofcom to develop and issue a code of practice on violence against women and girls. This will empower Ofcom and guide services in meeting their duties in regard to women and girls, and encourage them to recognise the many manifestations of online violence that disproportionately affect women and girls.

Refuge, the domestic abuse charity, has seen a growing number of cases of technology-facilitated domestic abuse in recent years. As other noble Lords have said, this tech abuse can take many forms but social media is a particularly powerful weapon for perpetrators, with one in three women experiencing online abuse, rising to almost two in three among young women. Yet the tech companies have been too slow to respond. Many survivors are left waiting weeks or months for a response when they report abusive content, if indeed they receive one at all. It appears that too many services do not understand the risks and nature of VAWG. They do not take complaints seriously and they think that this abuse does not breach community standards. A new code would address this with recommended measures and best practice on the appropriate prevention of and response to violence against women and girls. It would also support the delivery of existing duties set out in the Bill, such as those on illegal content, user empowerment and child safety.

I hope the Minister can accept this amendment, as it would be in keeping with other government policies, such as in the strategic policing requirement, which requires police forces to treat violence against women and girls as a national threat. Adding this code would help to meet the Government’s national and international commitments to tackling online VAWG, such as the tackling VAWG strategy and the Global Partnership for Action on Gender-Based Online Harassment and Abuse.

The Online Safety Bill is a chance to act on tackling the completely unacceptable levels of abuse of women and girls by making it clear through Ofcom that companies need to take this matter seriously and make systemic changes to the design and operation of their services to address VAWG. It would allow Ofcom to add this as a priority, as mandated in the Bill, rather than leave it as an optional extra to be tackled at a later date. The work to produce this code has already been done thanks to Refuge and other charities and academics who have produced a model that is freely available and has been shared with Ofcom. So it is not an extra burden and does not need to delay the implementation of the Bill; in fact, it will greatly aid Ofcom.

The Government are to be congratulated on their amendment to include controlling or coercive behaviour in their list of priority offences. I would like to congratulate them further if they can accept this valuable Amendment 97.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, I start by commending my noble friend Lady Morgan on her clear introduction to this group of amendments. I also commend the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, on her powerful speech.

From those who have spoken so far, we have a clear picture of the widespread nature of some of the abuse and offences that women experience when they go online. I note from what my noble friend Lady Morgan said that there is widespread support from a range of organisations outside the Committee for this group of amendments. She also made an important and powerful point about the potential chilling effect of this kind of activity on women, including women in public life, being able to exercise their right to freedom of expression.

I feel it is important for me to make it clear that—this is an obvious thing—I very much support tough legal and criminal sanctions against any perpetrator of violence or sexual abuse against women. I really do understand and support this, and hear the scale of the problem that is being outlined in this group of amendments.

Mine is a dissenting voice, in that I am not persuaded by the proposed solution to the problem that has been described. I will not take up a lot of the Committee’s time, but any noble Lords who were in the House when we were discussing a group of amendments on another piece of legislation earlier this year may remember that I spoke against making misogyny a hate crime. The reason why I did that then is similar, in that I feel somewhat nervous about introducing a code of conduct which is directly relevant to women. I do not like the idea of trying to address some of these serious problems by separating women from men. Although I know it is not the intention of a code such as this or any such measures, I feel that it perpetuates a sense of division between men and women. I just do not like the idea that we live in a society where we try to address problems by isolating or categorising ourselves into different groups of people, emphasising the sense of weakness and being victims of any kind of attack or offence from another group, and assuming that everybody who is in the other group will be a perpetrator of some kind of attack, criticism or violence against us.

My view is that, in a world where we see some of this serious activity happening, we should do more to support young men and boys to understand the proper expectations of them. When we get to the groups of amendments on pornography and what more we can do to prevent children’s access to it, I will be much more sympathetic. Forgive me if this sounds like motherhood and apple pie, but I want us to try to generate a society where basic standards of behaviour and social norms are shared between men and women, young and old. I lament how so much of this has broken down, and a lot of the problems we see in society are the fault of political and—dare I say it?—religious leaders not doing more to promote some of those social norms in the past. As I said, I do not want us to respond to the situation we are in by perpetuating more divisions.

I look forward to hearing what my noble friend the Minister has to say, but I am nervous about the solution proposed in the amendments.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, it gives me great pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell of Beeston, not least because she became a dissenting voice, and I was dreading that I might be the only one.

First, I think it important that we establish that those of us who have spent decades fighting violence against women and girls are not complacent about it. The question is whether the physical violence we describe in the Bill is the same as the abuse being described in the amendments. I worry about conflating online incivility, abuse and vile things said with physical violence, as is sometimes done.

I note that Refuge, an organisation I have a great deal of respect for, suggested that the user empowerment duties that opted to place the burden on women users to filter out their own online experience was the same as asking women to take control of their own safety and protect themselves offline from violence. I thought that was unfair, because user empowerment duties and deciding what you filter out can be women using their agency.

Online Safety Bill

Baroness Stowell of Beeston Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 11th May 2023 Lords Chamber

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

My Lords, His Majesty’s Government are committed to defending the invaluable role of our free media. We are clear that our online safety legislation must protect the vital role of the press in providing people with reliable and accurate information. That is why this Bill includes strong protections for recognised news publishers. The Bill does not impose new duties on news publishers’ content, which is exempt from the Bill’s safety duties. In addition, the Bill includes strong safeguards for news publisher content, set out in Clause 14. In order to benefit from these protections, publishers will have to meet a set of stringent criteria, set out in Clause 50.

I am aware of concerns in your Lordships’ House and another place that the definition of news publishers is too broad and that these protections could therefore create a loophole to be exploited. That is why the Government are bringing forward amendments to the definition of “recognised news publisher” to ensure that sanctioned entities cannot benefit from these protections. I will shortly explain these protections in detail but I would like to be clear that narrowing the definition any further would pose a critical risk to our commitment to self-regulation of the press. We do not want to create requirements which would in effect put Ofcom in the position of a press regulator. We believe that the criteria set out in Clause 50 are already strong, and we have taken significant care to ensure that established news publishers are captured, while limiting the opportunity for bad actors to benefit. 

Government Amendments 126A and 127A propose changes to the criteria for recognised news publishers. These criteria already exclude any entity that is a proscribed organisation under the Terrorism Act 2000 or the purpose of which is to support a proscribed organisation under that Act. We are clear that sanctioned news outlets such as RT, formerly Russia Today, must not benefit from these protections either. The amendments we are tabling today will therefore tighten the recognised news publisher criteria further by excluding entities that have been designated for sanctions imposed by both His Majesty’s Government and the United Nations Security Council. I hope noble Lords will accept these amendments, in order to ensure that content from publishers which pose a security threat to this country cannot benefit from protections designed to defend a free press.

In addition, the Government have also tabled amendments 50B, 50C, 50D, 127B, 127C and 283A, which are aimed at ensuring that the protections for news publishers in Clause 14 are workable and do not have unforeseen consequences for the operation of category 1 services. Clause 14 gives category 1 platforms a duty to notify recognised news publishers and offer a right of appeal before taking action against any of their content or accounts.

Clause 14 sets out the circumstances in which companies must offer news publishers an appeal. As drafted, it states that platforms must offer this before they take down news publisher content, before they restrict users’ access to such content or where they propose to “take any other action” in relation to publisher content. Platforms must also offer an appeal if they propose to take action against a registered news publisher’s account by giving them a warning, suspending or banning them from using a service or in any way restricting their ability to use a service.

These amendments provide greater clarity about what constitutes “taking action” in relation to news publisher content, and therefore when category 1 services must offer an appeal. They make it clear that a platform must offer this before they take down such content, add a warning label or take any other action against content in line with any terms of service that allow or prohibit content. This will ensure that platforms are not required to offer publishers a right of appeal every time they propose to carry out routine content curation and similar routine actions. That would be unworkable for platforms and would be likely to inhibit the effectiveness of the appeal process.

As noble Lords know, the Bill has a strong focus on user empowerment and enabling users to take control of their online experience. The Government have therefore tabled amendments to Clause 52 to ensure that providers are required only to offer publishers a right of appeal in relation to their own moderation decisions, not where a user has voluntarily chosen not to view certain types of content. For example, if a user has epilepsy and has opted not to view photo-sensitive content, platforms will not be required to offer publishers a right of appeal before restricting that content for the user in question.

In addition, to ensure that the Bill maintains strong protections for children, the amendments make it clear that platforms are not required to offer news publishers an appeal before applying warning labels to content viewed by children. The amendments also make it clear that platforms would be in breach of the legislation if they applied warning labels to content encountered by adults without first offering news publishers an appeal, but in order to ensure that the Bill maintains strong protections for children, that does not apply to warning labels on content encountered by children. I beg to move.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, I welcome the amendments the Government have tabled, but I ask the Minister to clarify the effect of Amendment 50E. I declare an interest as chair of the Communications and Digital Select Committee, which has discussed Amendment 50E and the labelling of content for children with the news media organisations. This is a very technical issue, but from what my noble friend was just saying, it seems that content that would qualify for labelling for child protection purposes, and which therefore does not qualify for a right of appeal before the content is so labelled, is not content that would normally be encountered by adults but might happen to appeal to children. I would like to be clear that we are not giving the platforms scope for adding labels to content that they ought not to be adding labels to. That aside, as I say, I am grateful to my noble friend for these amendments.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, like the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, I have no major objection and support the Government’s amendments. In a sense the Minister got his retaliation in first, because we will have a much more substantial debate on the scope of Clause 14. At this point I welcome any restriction on Clause 14 in the way that the Minister has stated.

Yet to come we have the whole issue of whether an unregulated recognised news publisher, effectively unregulated by the PRP’s arrangements, should be entitled to complete freedom in terms of below-the-line content, where there is no moderation and it does not have what qualifies as independent regulation. Some debates are coming down the track and—just kicking the tyres on the Minister’s amendments—I think the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, made a fair point, which I hope the Minister will answer.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, I am sorry; in my enthusiasm to get this day of Committee off to a swift start, I perhaps rattled through that rather quickly. On Amendment 50E, which my noble friend Lady Stowell asked about, I make clear that platforms will be in breach of their duties if, without applying the protection, they add warning labels to news publishers’ content that they know will be seen by adult users, regardless of whether that content particularly appeals to children.

As the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, and others noted, we will return to some of the underlying principles later on, but the Government have laid these amendments to clarify category 1 platforms’ duties to protect recognised news publishers’ content. They take some publishers out of scope of the protections and make it clearer that category 1 platforms will have only to offer news publishers an appeal before taking punitive actions against their content.

The noble Baroness, Lady Fox, asked about how we define “recognised news publisher”. I am conscious that we will debate this more in later groups, but Clause 50 sets out a range of criteria that an organisation must meet to qualify as a recognised news publisher. These include the organisation’s “principal purpose” being the publication of news, it being subject to a “standards code” and its content being “created by different persons”. The protections for organisations are focused on publishers whose primary purpose is reporting on news and current affairs, recognising the importance of that in a democratic society. I am grateful to noble Lords for their support.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

What my noble friend said is absolutely fine with me, and I thank him very much for it. It might be worth letting the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, know that Amendment 127 has now been moved to the group that the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, referred to. I thought it was worth offering that comfort to the noble Baroness.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

To be continued.

Online Safety Bill

Baroness Stowell of Beeston Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 9th May 2023 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

46: After Clause 12, insert the following new Clause—
“Adult risk assessment duties
(1) This section sets out the duties about risk assessments in respect of adult users which apply in relation to Category 1 services.(2) A duty to carry out a suitable and sufficient adults’ risk assessment.(3) A duty to take appropriate steps to keep an adults’ risk assessment up to date, including when OFCOM make any significant change to a risk profile that relates to services of the kind in question.(4) Before making any significant change to any aspect of a service’s design or operation, a duty to carry out a further suitable and sufficient adults’ risk assessment relating to the impacts of that proposed change.(5) An “adults’ risk assessment” of a service of a particular kind means an assessment of the following matters, taking into account the risk profile that relates to services of that kind—(a) the user base;(b) the level of risk of adults who are users of the service encountering, by means of the service, each kind of content specified in section 12(10) to (12), taking into account (in particular) algorithms used by the service, and how easily, quickly and widely content may be disseminated by means of the service;(c) the level of risk of functionalities of the service, including user empowerment tools, which facilitate the presence, identification, dissemination, and likelihood of users encountering or being alerted to, content specified in section 12(10) to (12);(d) the extent to which user empowerment tools might result in interference with users’ right to freedom of expression within the law (see section 18);(e) how the design and operation of the service (including the business model, governance, use of proactive technology, measures to promote users’ media literacy and safe use of the service, and other systems and processes) may reduce or increase the risks identified.”Member’s explanatory statement
This and other amendments in the name of Baroness Stowell relate to risk assessments for adults in relation to platforms’ new duties to provide user empowerment tools. They would require platforms to provide public risk assessments in their terms of service and be transparent about the effect of user empowerment tools on users’ freedom of expression.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, in introducing this group, I will speak directly to the three amendments in my name—Amendments 46, 47 and 64. I will also make some general remarks about the issue of freedom of speech and of expression, which is the theme of this group. I will come to these in a moment.

The noble Lord, Lord McNally, said earlier that I had taken my amendments out of a different group— I hope from my introductory remarks that it will be clear why—but, in doing so, I did not realise that I would end up opening on this group. I offer my apologies to the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson of Balmacara, for usurping his position in getting us started.

I am grateful to the noble Baronesses, Lady Bull and Lady Featherstone, for adding their names. The amendments represent the position of the Communications and Digital Select Committee of your Lordships’ House. In proposing them, I do so with that authority. My co-signatories are a recent and a current member. I should add sincere apologies from the noble Baroness, Lady Featherstone, for not being here this evening. If she is watching, I send her my very best wishes.

When my noble friend Lord Gilbert of Panteg was its chair, the committee carried out an inquiry into freedom of speech online. This has already been remarked on this evening. At part of that inquiry, the committee concluded that the Government’s proposals in the then draft Bill—which may have just been a White Paper at that time—for content described as legal but harmful were detrimental to freedom of speech. It called for changes. Since then, as we know, the Government have dropped legal but harmful and instead introduced new user empowerment tools for adults to filter out harmful content. As we heard in earlier groups this evening, these would allow people to turn off or on content about subjects such as eating disorders and self-harm.

Some members of our committee might favour enhanced protection for adults. Indeed, some of my colleagues have already spoken in support of amendments to this end in other groups. Earlier this year, when the committee looked at the Bill as it had been reintroduced to Parliament, we agreed that, as things stood, these new user empowerment tools were a threat to freedom of speech. Whatever one’s views, there is no way of judging their impact or effectiveness—whether good or bad.

As we have heard already this evening, the Government have dropped the requirement for platforms to provide a public risk assessment of how these tools would work and their impact on freedom of speech. To be clear, for these user empowerment tools to be effective, the platforms will have to identify the content that users can switch off. This gives the platforms great power over what is deemed harmful to adults. Amendments 46, 47 and 64 are about ensuring that tech platforms are transparent about how they balance the principles of privacy, safety and freedom of speech for adults. These amendments would require platforms to undertake a risk assessment and publish a summary in their terms of service. This would involve them being clear about the effect of user empowerment tools on the users’ freedom of expression. Without such assessments, there is a risk that platforms would do either too much or too little. It would be very difficult to find out how they are filtering content and on what basis, and how they are addressing the twin imperatives of ensuring online safety without unduly affecting free speech.

To be clear, these amendments, unlike amendments in earlier groups, are neither about seeking to provide greater protection to adults nor about trying to reopen or revisit the question of legal but harmful. They are about ensuring transparency to give all users confidence about how platforms are striking the right balance. While their purpose is to safeguard freedom of speech, they would also bring benefits to those adults who wanted to opt in to the user empowerment tool because they would be able to assess what it was they were choosing not to see.

It is because of their twin benefits—indeed, their benefit to everyone—that we decided formally, as a committee, to recommend these amendments to the Government and for debate by your Lordships’ House. That said, the debate earlier suggests support for a different approach to enhancing protection for adults, and we may discover through this debate a preference for other amendments in this group to protect freedom of speech—but that is why we have brought these amendments forward.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, your Lordships will want me to be brief, bearing in mind the time. I am very grateful for the support I received from my noble friends Lady Harding and Lady Fraser and the noble Baronesses, Lady Kidron and Lady Bull, for the amendments I tabled. I am particularly grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Bull, for the detail she added to my description of the amendments. I can always rely on the noble Baroness to colour in my rather broad-brush approach to these sorts of things.

I am pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, made his remarks at the beginning of the debate. That was very helpful in setting the context that followed. We have heard a basic theme come through from your Lordships: a lack of certainty that the Government have struck the right balance between privacy protection and freedom of expression. I never stop learning in your Lordships’ House. I was very pleased to learn from the new Milton—my noble friend Lord Moylan—that freedom of expression is a fundamental right. Therefore, the balance between that and the other things in the Bill needs to be considered in a way I had not thought of before.

What is clear is that there is a lack of confidence from all noble Lords—irrespective of the direction they are coming from in their contributions to this and earlier debates— either that the balance has been properly struck or that some of the clauses seeking to address freedom of speech in the Bill are doing so in a way that will deliver the outcome and overall purpose of this legislation as brought forward by the Government.

I will make a couple of other points. My noble friend Lord Moylan’s amendments about the power of Ofcom in this context were particularly interesting. I have some sympathy for what he was arguing. As I said earlier, the question of power and the distribution of it between the various parties involved in this new regime will be one we will look at in broad terms certainly in later groups.

On the amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, on Clauses 13, 14 and so on and the protections and provisions for news media, I tend towards the position of my noble friend Lord Black, against what the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, argued. As I said at the beginning, I am concerned about the censorship of our news organisations by the tech firms. But I also see his argument, and that of the noble Viscount, Lord Colville, that it is not just our traditional legacy media that provides quality journalism now—that is an important issue for us to address.

I am grateful to my noble friend the Minister for his round-up and concluding remarks. Although it is heartening to hear that he and the Bill team will consider the amendment from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, in this group, we are looking—in the various debates today, for sure—for a little more responsiveness and willingness to consider movement by the Government on various matters. I hope that he is able to give us more encouraging signs of this, as we proceed through Committee and before we get to further discussions with him—I hope—outside the Chamber before Report. With that, I of course withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 46 withdrawn.