Gavin Newlands
Main Page: Gavin Newlands (Scottish National Party - Paisley and Renfrewshire North)
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
I thank the right hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller) and the hon. Member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire (Simon Hart) for securing this debate, through the Backbench Business Committee. Let me start my contribution by saying how much I value social media. As an MP, it allows me to engage directly with constituents, enabling me to promote the work I do. Social media also makes it easier for my constituents to contact me and for me to hear at first hand from my constituents about the issues that are important to them. I also know that the general public value their use of social media. It has become a staple part of our daily lives—my wife would probably say it has become far too much of a staple. Tools such as Facebook and Twitter allow people to keep in touch with one another regardless of whether they are in different corners of the globe or, sadly, just in different corners of the living room. In the UK, Facebook has 32 million users and Twitter now has 16 million users tweeting on a daily basis. The vast majority of people who use social media do so in a respectable and proper manner. They engage with other users in a friendly and cordial manner. As a politician, I can testify that the overwhelming majority of people who talk to me online, even those who disagree, do so with respect—or something close to it. However, as with a lot of things, there are always a few who ruin it for everyone else, and unfortunately social media and other online forums do have a small but significant minority who engage in abusive and poisonous behaviour.
Like every other political party, the SNP condemns all online abuse and supports any measure to ensure that those involved are held to account by the security and policing authorities. The First Minister of Scotland has addressed this issue and is one of UK politics’ best users of Twitter to communicate and engage with the electorate. She has previously said that robust political debate forms an important part of a democracy, but that debate and discussion must be conducted in a polite and appropriate manner. I think that is a message that we can all agree on. I do not accept the view that public servants are fair game to be abused and that such abuse is part and parcel of being a politician. Any abuse, no matter who is on the receiving end of it, should be condemned—that includes threats to politicians. Like many Members in this Chamber, I have had some abuse, but the cowards that troll online are usually men who reserve some of their worst abuse for female Members. These are not real men hiding behind their keyboards and their anonymous user names, but small and pathetic men whose actions can ultimately have serious and tragic repercussions.
Politicians are not the abuser’s only target. It appears that no one can escape the poison that blights the internet. I spoke in the debate during carers’ week and mentioned that a lot of carers were tweeting about their experiences of caring for a loved one. That online campaign was incredibly informative and provided an insight into the issues that carers face. However, it is shameful that even carers cannot escape the abuse from the trolls.
We need to get to the bottom of why so many people think it is okay to send abusive online messages. In 2014, 1,209 people were convicted of internet trolling under section 127 of the Communications Act 2003. Of those convicted, only 155 were jailed for sending messages or other material that were grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character. The truth is that there are far, far more people engaging in abusive activity than the 1,200 people who were convicted, let alone the 155 who served some jail time. The scale of the problem is unclear. The think-tank Demos found that 10,000 tweets aggressively attacking someone were sent from UK accounts over a three-week period.
As a father of two young girls, I am particularly concerned about the increasing incidence of children being bullied online. The rise of cyber-bullying has allowed bullies to extend their vicious behaviour beyond the classroom. There are currently no official statistics on the number of children who are bullied, but from research studies and from what children tell us, we know that bullying is an issue that affects almost all children in some way. DoSomething.org, one of the largest organisations for young people on social change, suggests that nearly 43% of children have been bullied online, with this abusive behaviour occurring on more than one occasion.
Equally worrying is that 90% of teens who witness social media bullying say that they have ignored it. Kids who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, transsexual and intersexed, who have a disability, and who are from African, Caribbean, Asian, middle eastern and other minority groups are far more likely to encounter such cyber-bullying.
We must also consider why people on the receiving end of such abusive online behaviour choose to ignore it. We simply would not accept it if we witnessed abuse in person in the street or in the classroom. We should send a message that cyber-bullying and any form of online abuse cannot be tolerated and should be reported at every opportunity.
As I mentioned earlier, the rise of the internet and social media has made it easier for women to be attacked and abused. The revenge porn helpline has received almost 4,000 calls in the past year from people receiving sexually abusive messages online. Reported cases of revenge porn—the sharing of explicit or sexual images without consent—have risen markedly, with alleged victims ranging from 11 years old to pensioners. Two thirds of the incidents involved women under the age of 30, with suspects mainly being former partners. There were eight complaints from females to every one complaint from a male. Such statistics sound all too similar to the incidence of domestic violence.
Undoubtedly, this is an extremely difficult problem to solve, but work is being done to reduce cyber-bullying. For instance, the Scottish National party Government have funded Respectme, which was mentioned earlier. Scotland’s anti-bullying service, which acts as a source of information for young people in Scotland, has created and made available publications to raise awareness on the issues of cyber-bullying. Respectme has highlighted the fact that bullying is bullying whether it takes place in the street, in the playground or online and we should treat it all with equal import.
We need to develop effective policies to tackle online bullying in all its various forms. We should send out a central message that anyone who has been a victim of online abuse should not hesitate to report it to the police immediately. I agree with the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Liz McInnes) that companies such as Facebook and Twitter could and should do much more to investigate or block abusive posts. No one should have to go home from work or school and experience online bullying. As well as offering support to the victims of online bullying, we must also take serious action to deal with the perpetrators of this vicious, poisonous and, ultimately, cowardly behaviour.