Elected Women Representatives: Online Abuse

Ian Paisley Excerpts

Tuesday 20th April 2021 Westminster Hall

[Ian Paisley (in the Chair)]

I remind hon. Members that there have been some changes to normal practice in order to support the new hybrid arrangements. Timings of debates have been slightly amended to allow technical arrangements to be made for the next debate. There will be suspensions between debates. I remind Members participating, physically and virtually, that they must arrive for the start of a debate in Westminster Hall and are expected to remain for the entire debate. I must remind Members participating virtually that they are visible at all times, both to one another and to us in the Boothroyd Room. If Members attending virtually have any technical problems, they should email the Westminster Hall Clerks’ email address. Members attending physically should clean their spaces before they use them and before they leave the room. I remind Members that Mr Speaker has stated that masks should be worn in Westminster Hall—although, of course, not when you are speaking. Members attending physically who are in the latter stages of the call list should use the seats in the Public Gallery initially and move on to the horseshoe when seats there become available. Members can speak from the horseshoe only where there are microphones to facilitate Hansard.

It is my pleasure to call Maria Miller to move the motion.

[Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered online abuse of elected women representatives.

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley. I start by thanking the Backbench Business Committee for granting this debate, which was called for by members of the all-party parliamentary group on women in Parliament. It is a great privilege for me to be able to open the debate. May I, in advance, thank hon. Members for their overwhelming support for the debate today? I also thank the organisations that have provided briefings, including the Local Government Association, the Centenary Action Group, the Fawcett Society and Compassion in Politics.

Parliaments are at their best when they are diverse. King’s College London’s global institute for women’s leadership, chaired by Julia Gillard, put it well when it showed the evidence that equal participation of men and women strengthens our democracy. We have made huge progress here: one in three of our Members is now female. Record numbers of women stood for election in 2019, and record numbers were elected to this place. They were inspired to make a difference to their community and their country; inspired not to accept the world as it is but to put themselves forward, despite the barriers that remain, to be here and to be able to change things; and inspired by many of the right hon. and hon. Members taking part in the debate today. Many Members, including in this debate, do not want to accept politics as it is today —a politics in which aggression and abuse are part and parcel of our working day. That is not the democracy that we have signed up for. We want a democracy that relies not on that, but on reasoned debate.

The evidence is also clear that online abuse is not only a factor in preventing women from taking on careers in politics; it is also cutting short the careers of those who stand and are successful in being elected. Members of the APPG on women in Parliament called for this debate because tackling online abuse, particularly when it impacts the freedom of speech of elected Members, needs to be a bigger priority, not only for the Government but for Parliament.

Mr Speaker has done an incredible amount of work to improve the physical security of Members. I very much welcome in particular the statement on 9 March 2021 by my hon. Friend the Minister for the Constitution and Devolution, updating the House on progress on tackling intimidation in public life, but three years on from the original review, we are still waiting for a cohesive plan, with Parliament and Government working together. We need to redouble our efforts in this area, ensuring that we have a comprehensive package of the right laws to tackle online abuse, the right support and awareness of the law that is in place, the right punishments for those who seek to silence democratically elected representatives, and the right support for staff and colleagues who are victims of these dreadful abuses.

Let us be clear about what this abuse looks like. It is not offensive language. It is not strongly held views in political debate. For some colleagues, online abuse is a threat of rape, murder, stalking, or physical violence towards them or their families. At other times it is mass co-ordinated online harassment by groups. Online anonymity means the police can find it difficult to take action swiftly. Above all, online abuse is an attempt to keep women away from contributing to political life. As elected representatives, we condemn those who take that approach, and we need to redouble our efforts to stop them.

I want to be clear: MP or not, there is absolutely no place for any vile abuse online and the law needs to protect everyone better. I look forward to the introduction of the Government’s online harms Bill as soon as possible. Legislation needs to specifically address online abuse, which is designed to bully, intimidate and silence. When it comes to elected representatives, we need to recognise that the impact of that abuse is particularly concerning and unacceptable. In a free and open democracy, no elected representative should ever be intimidated or feel constrained in speaking out on behalf of their constituents, but that, at the moment, is exactly what happens.

This debate is about elected female representatives who endure online abuse disproportionately, but I know that many, including the Local Government Association, are concerned that those from black and minority ethnic backgrounds, members of the LGBT+ community and those with disabilities are also being particularly targeted.

The current police advice is to remove victims’ social media presence, which is completely unacceptable as it prevents candidates from campaigning online and engaging effectively with residents once they are elected. It is clear that action is needed swiftly, well before the next general election, if we are to stop that unacceptable impact on our democracy.

Let us look at the evidence before us. Elected women MPs already report that the levels of online abuse and treatment from the media that they experience would have stopped them putting themselves forward for selection if they had known the extent to which it would affect them and their family lives, according to research from the Fawcett Society, which might help to account for why women’s tenure as Members of Parliament is significantly shorter than that of male Members. Unfortunately, the abuse is not limited to them. Family members, children and often staff members are also subjected to harassment, and it puts women off standing in the first place.

In its Equal Power project, the Fawcett Society found that almost 70% of respondents cited abuse or harassment as a reason for not pursuing a career in politics. The evidence is really clear. Although the rise in abuse impacts all candidates, the increase in hate and abuse towards women over the past three general elections was almost double that experienced by men, according to data from the Constitution Unit at University College London. The University of Sheffield’s research has shown that rising abuse against women MPs has persisted during the pandemic. The role of online media in delivering that abuse is significant.

The Minister will no doubt say that what is illegal offline is illegal online, so the police can and do take action on threats to murder, rape, sexually assault and stalk. There have been many cases of online abuse involving female MPs and many convictions in the past 12 months. There is no definitive figure, however, on the number of reports, the number of cases taken forward, and the number of convictions. If Parliament is to take its equality duties seriously, it should closely monitor that, and commission research on why male and female elected Members are treated so differently on social media to ensure that measures are in place to deal with it.

This is not just a UK problem. In 2016, a study by the Inter-Parliamentary Union found that 82% of women politicians surveyed in 39 countries had experienced some form of psychological violence. Indeed, 44% had received death threats, or threats of rape, beatings or abduction, and 65% had been subject to sexist remarks. In our year of hosting the G7, let us use this opportunity to draw nations together to voice our solidarity with women across the globe by pledging our support for democratically elected women, and to advocate laws and support that stop the abuse worldwide.

Gone are the days when we did not know what to do about online abuse. We know. We need to have clear laws and the Government must not only promptly bring forward the legislation to introduce the new electoral sanction on intimidation, but use the online harms Bill to recognise the harm faced by women and elected representatives when they deal with social media.

Research by the think-tank Compassion in Politics found that more than one in four people is put off posting on social media because of dreadful abuse. We cannot have an open and honest pluralistic political debate online in an atmosphere in which people are scared to speak up. I hope the Government will also look to tackle anonymous social media accounts in the online harms Bill. I support the idea of giving people the opportunity to create verified accounts by supplying a piece of personal identification, and also of having the ability to filter out unverified accounts. Does the Minister agree that we need to change the culture from the police recommendation that victims move offline, and move to social media platforms banning abusers, with sanctions to incentivise social media platforms to act quickly when abuse actually happens?

The House of Commons itself has a role as an entity to play in this issue. Online abuse must be treated as workplace harassment, a safety hazard by the House of Commons authorities, who should provide training and support—not only to MPs but to our constituency staff, who often have to deal with this abuse on a daily basis—so that we can all feel safer, more prepared and better able to protect ourselves. Political parties have a role, particularly when it comes to candidates. My right hon. Friend the Member for Cannock Chase (Amanda Milling) has already made significant changes in the support provided by the Conservative party. The House of Commons has a duty to protect our democracy and should routinely collect and analyse data that breaks down why we fail to have a fully representative Parliament, including the impact of online abuse on female MPs.

I want the Government to think about how we fund the programmes to tackle online abuse. According to the Office for National Statistics, the new digital services tax of 2% on tech giants such as Facebook, Google and Twitter raised £29 million in the first month of operation alone. Let us take the polluter pays principle and use the money yielded from that to provide the sort of support against online abuse that women and girls need more generally, but that is also needed to protect democratically elected women both at local and national level.

Sixteen months ago, we celebrated record numbers of women being elected to Parliament and we still celebrate and encourage more women to stand for election. All the main parties agree that a 50:50 Parliament would be a better place, but the facts speak loudly. The Fawcett Society’s Equal Power project found that almost 60% of women surveyed said they were unlikely to stand as an MP and 44% were unlikely to stand as a councillor. Nearly a year on from that, those numbers have risen to 74% and 62%, respectively. This is a worrying state of affairs, particularly when we see that 69% of respondents cited abuse or harassment as the key reason for not pursuing a career in politics. Online abuse is a significant part of that. This is a barrier that has to be lifted, for the strength of our democracy. It is in our power to tackle this. Parliament, Government and parties have to work together to do just that.

[Ian Paisley (in the Chair)]

Before I call our next speaker, who will be Caroline Nokes—just to give her early warning—Members will have four minutes to speak.

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

Thank you, Mr Paisley. I pay tribute to my near neighbour, my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller) for leading this important debate today.

The Women and Equalities Committee has recently launched an inquiry into the cultures underpinning male violence against women and, sadly, I see the online abuse of female parliamentarians as part of that same culture. Trolling might lead somewhere, and the reality is that none of us either in this debate today or in Parliament more widely knows which of our online trolls might turn into a stalker or who, indeed, might in due course turn into somebody who attends our office, our surgery, our home and threatens us physically. This week’s troll could be next week’s attacker. While I will always glibly say that the solution to the online abuse that we receive as female parliamentarians is simply to use the block and the mute button, the reality is that we cannot do that in every case and, in so doing, we might miss the person who is a physical threat to us .

I was pleased to hear my right hon. Friend talk about diversity, but I regret that she stopped short at one point. We know that female parliamentarians are more abused than their male counterparts, but we also know that black female MPs receive the most abuse of all, and that the right hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott) receives more abuse than every other parliamentarian put together. That is a stark reminder that there is still in our country an undercurrent of misogyny and racism. We also know—my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke was right to point it out—that those who have disabilities and are LGBTQ also face more abuse. We have to stamp out these awful discriminatory, bullying, harassing tactics for good.

I do not pretend that the block and the mute button are the solution—they are not. They may be part of it on an individual level, but we need effective legislation. I am pleased to see the Minister in her place, but I have grave concerns that the online harms Bill will not do the job. We know that it aims to crack down on the illegal, which is good, and prevent young people from accessing harmful content on the internet, but we will have to be explicit about what we are trying to achieve when it comes to stopping the abuse that we all receive on a daily basis.

There is real merit in stamping out anonymity. I think that is one of the massive challenges that we face. People are emboldened when they can hide their true identity. We know they are also emboldened when they are behind a screen. While I do not wish today’s debate to turn into a whinge-fest of who has the worst story, the thing that struck me about two of my most prolific online abusers was that the day I met them in the street, they stared at the pavement and shuffled past. Of course, that is what we know about bullies—at heart, they are also cowards. If they cannot hide behind anonymity, it will stamp out their cowardice because they will have to reveal who they are and I do not believe they are brave enough to do so.

The problem exists across the globe. I remember meeting female parliamentarians from Jordan who experienced exactly the same as we do in the UK. We have to learn from what is being done internationally and work as a global community to stand up for our democracy. We have to stand up for those women who are brave enough to enter public life, but make sure that the legislation is there to protect them and keep them safe from this sort of abuse.

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[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP) [V]]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Paisley. I was not planning to speak in this debate. It has been my preference not to speak about the online abuse that I face, because frankly I have never really wanted to give these people credence by even acknowledging it. That is my choice, which suits me. Others, as we have heard very eloquently, have chosen differently, and I say good for them. We should all deal with this nonsense in whatever way we feel is best.

I decided to speak today because I had agreed to speak in an event later this week organised by Women 5050. I felt that were I to stand up and tell them that it was all fantastic being a public representative and not mention the cesspit that is online commentary, I would be a bit dishonest and a bit of hypocrite. Just to be clear: I love my job. Let us also be clear that we know, as politicians, that we have chosen to be in public life. That brings with it an acceptance of public criticism, but that should not be an acceptance of threats or abuse.

Although it is the biggest privilege of my life to represent people in my local area and to be part of a party and movement that I believe in so strongly, and I would obviously encourage others to take that step too, it is not all sweetness and light. Maybe calling it out, at least sometimes, makes the road for the next woman coming along a little smoother.

I will dwell a little on Women 5050, whose website makes stark reading. It says:

“Today, despite making up 52% of the population, in Scotland women only make up 42% of public board members, 25% of public board chairs, 35% of MSPs”.

That is not good enough, and I am delighted by the steps that the Scottish National party has taken and is taking, whether that be on our gender-balanced Cabinet; Nicola Sturgeon, who works so hard to push on equality; the central focus on women in our Holyrood manifesto; or our gender balance in candidate selection.

Of course, the Westminster Parliament has so much further to go to achieve equality, but whether it is in Holyrood, Westminster or council chambers, or in political discussion anywhere, statistics show us that this is a real issue across the world. We have a problem with online abuse, harassment and worse. If we do not tackle it, we are going to lose out. We need to take steps now and to make our Parliaments look much more like our countries.

When Women 5050 approached me, it mentioned that my colleague Fatima Joji had been involved in its work. That settled it for me in terms of participating in its events and in the debate today. As well as being an excellent candidate in the Holyrood election—she would make an outstanding MSP—as a young black women in politics, Fatima has been subjected to even more nastiness, bile and abuse than other women in the public eye, but she persists and we are all the better for her participation and that of all the other women we have heard about today.

We have heard clearly today that our female black and minority ethnic representatives in particular experience such a lot of disgraceful abuse—it is not on. Politics is not for the fainthearted, nor should it be for robots devoid of human feelings. It is not just in Parliaments that women are disproportionately impacted by this online bile. Our council chambers and political movements are full of women who are subjected to nastiness, name-calling, lies and threats. It needs to stop. I discussed this yesterday with a woman friend who is a local councillor and the sad thing is that we spoke about it as if it was completely normal. Of course, it is normal in our experience, but it really should not be.

One of the things that can be so difficult is the nameless, faceless nature of a lot of this. Apart from the fact that abusers are clearly complete cowards hiding behind their wee avatars, it is obviously much more difficult to deal with when we have no idea who it is who feels so emboldened by their anonymity to post things that they would certainly never have the balls to say in real life to their wife or with their mum listening in or to their friendly local police officer. As we have heard, it sometimes spills off social media to other corners of the internet, or off the internet completely, which can be very concerning.

I have been actively involved in politics since 2014 and there is no doubt that there is more and worse abuse now than there was then. Rather than the terrible murder of Jo Cox being the catalyst it should have been for a reset, which was surely the only appropriate response to such an awful event, we see now that it has actually been amplified with a good dose of fake news stirred in, because plain abuse on its own is not good enough.

We sometimes know the people online who feed on hate or feel brave enough to send stuff our way would struggle with if it came back in the same direction. Sometimes, there is not a law against it, because it skirts pretty close, but it is unedifying none the less. Facebook is pretty rubbish, frankly, at dealing with it. It is not really interested in that any more than it is in dealing with the fake news. Twitter is only marginally better.

It was telling at the recent International Women’s Day debate, which was a very sombre affair in the shadow of Sarah Everard’s murder, there was a palpable scunner—I do not know how better to express that—at the online crap that every single woman in the Chamber that day, no matter our variety of political opinions, knew all about. That day it felt like we were collectively worn down.

We need to do something. I say again, I am fortunate to do the job I do. I know others say they might not have pursued their career again if they had known. I understand that, but I am delighted to be here today. I am delighted to speak, because, although it is against my better judgement in some ways, we have to stand up and say that we will not allow this to prevent women from getting into politics and making a difference. I am also delighted with the work the SNP Scottish Government are doing to try to improve fairness and political representation. It makes a difference and is very powerful.

We support the ambitions of the online harms Bill, especially when it comes to the issues that affect vulnerable people and children. We urge the UK Government to take it further and be stronger. Do not let big tech shirk away from its responsibilities. The points about the ways in which we can clean up the internet—giving people the opportunity to verify their identity and making it easier to block unverified users—are well made, although they do not come without their own challenges. Whatever the solution, not only for elected representatives but for other vulnerable people in danger of harm online, the real danger is that if we do not stand up and take steps, it will only get significantly worse.

[Ian Paisley (in the Chair)]

I do not know whether Hansard reporters know the word “scunner”, but I will try to inform them from across the sheugh what it was you actually said. Thank you for your contribution. I call the Opposition spokesperson, Christian Matheson.

[Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)]

It is always a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley. I thank all hon. Members who have taken part in today’s debate, particularly my hon. Friends the Members for Canterbury (Rosie Duffield), for Erith and Thamesmead (Abena Oppong-Asare) and for Jarrow (Kate Osborne). I congratulate the right hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller) on securing this debate. I pay tribute to the consistent leadership that she has shown in this House and in public over many years. I know it is appreciated by hon. Members across the House.

Let me reflect on two matters. First, the issue goes to the heart of our democracy. If hon. Members in this Chamber went on an election monitoring visit and they were outside a polling station where there was an armed militia outside preventing a section of society from either voting or getting involved in democracy, they would give a black mark against the quality of democracy in the country they were monitoring. That is exactly what is happening here—a section of our community is being prevented from full participating in our democracy.

Three years ago we remembered the 100th anniversary of universal women’s suffrage. That of course referred to women having the vote. I like to think that these days suffrage means full participation as well. If we have not got full participation, we do not have the women’s suffrage that we celebrated the 100th anniversary of. It goes to the heart of the quality of our democracy and should be a matter for us all.

I also want to reflect on something that my hon. Friend the Member for Jarrow mentioned. I am a white male MP. The truth is that I do not know the half of it. I know there is a problem, but I cannot claim to know the half of it. You, Mr Paisley, and the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone) might feel the same, but we do not understand the intensity, the ferocity and the incessant nature of the abuse that women and also black and minority ethnic MPs receive day after day. I lay down a challenge to male hon. Members from across the House: let us understand how incessant and ferocious the abuse is, or at least accept the fact that we do not understand it and listen to our female colleagues. Male Members understand there is an issue, but the severity, the ferocity and incessant nature of it is not understood.

We know of the benefits of the internet. During lockdown it has kept us in contact, and we have been able to continue shopping, learning and working, but we also know how dark it can be and how that corrodes society. We have heard reference to the Inter-Parliamentary Union’s 2016 survey: 39 countries found that 82% of women politicians surveyed had experienced some form of psychological violence; 44%—almost half—had received threats of death, rape, beatings or abduction; and 65% had been subjected to sexist remarks.

As we have also heard today from hon. Members, those from a black, Asian or minority ethnic background face an increased risk of abuse on the basis of their race as well as their gender, and there has been reference to the Amnesty International report and the number of tweets that women from those backgrounds have received. Behind every one of those statistics is an individual, a family or a staff member who faces the abuse, as I say, almost daily. Nobody should have to worry about their safety or their family’s safety when they come in to work, but, as we have heard today, that is the reality for women representatives.

Research indicates that Parliaments are much more likely to substantially tackle key issues such as violence and harassment against women when an increased number of female legislators are elected. However, those issues put off many women from standing to be elected. We have heard that 34% of MPs and 35% of local councillors in England and Wales are women. We all want more diversity to drive more effective and inclusive policy making. But we have also heard today about the report from the Fawcett Society on this issue that says that the number of women unlikely to stand as an MP has risen to 74% from 59% and that 69% of respondents said that abuse or harassment from the public or other parties was one of the main reasons for not pursuing a career in politics.

The hon. Member for North Devon (Selaine Saxby) asked an interesting question about why people carry out this abuse. I know that the Chair of the Select Committee, the right hon. Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes), has talked about facing down bullies involved in it. The mentality behind it perplexes me, but it is something that we need to try to understand. A report from the Centre for Countering Digital Hate shows that there are people who seem to enjoy causing harm to others. That psychological trait is known as negative social potency. When those people see that their abuse has caused someone harm, that gives them the validation that they are looking for. Perhaps more worryingly, the report also talks about purposely organised online hate networks. The Centre for Countering Digital Hate found a playbook, published on a far-right website, that instructed readers to target abuse at high-profile public figures as a way to generate more publicity for their extremist ideas.

Social media platforms such as Facebook, Google, YouTube, Instagram and Twitter are now part of our daily lives. Yes, they may bring benefits, but we have allowed them to become a safe space for sexism, misogyny and racism. That cannot be the norm. Online, a person can become anyone or no one if they like, with no consequences for their actions. Increased anonymity online leads to increasingly hateful and abusive language. People online feel that they can hide behind a mask and get away with language and actions that they would not otherwise do, as the Chair of the Select Committee illustrated when she faced down some of her abusers in the street.

Tackling abuse and extremism online must mean tackling the worst parts of anonymity online. The hon. Member for Stroud (Siobhan Baillie), who is not in her place, and the hon. Member for Wolverhampton North East (Jane Stevenson) talked about anonymity. The hon. Member for Wolverhampton North East also talked about some of the benefits of anonymity—for example, for whistleblowers, victims finding online refuge, or children and minorities. There are downsides to banning anonymity, and we have to find a mechanism for exposing identity where that is necessary but protecting anonymity in those cases in which it is important.

The individuals behind online hate and abuse are of course guilty of this unacceptable behaviour, and it is the huge foreign tech giants that need to start taking responsibility for the hate that exists on their platforms. No matter how vulnerable or well informed people are, they have little control over the content, which is curated by tech platforms, allowing the spread of disinformation, sexual exploitation, fake news, extremism, hatred and other harmful content—the misogyny that we are talking about today.

The main reason why tech giants refuse properly to tackle hate on their platforms is clear. Unsurprisingly, that is driven by their financial interests. They are reluctant to spend money hiring moderators, although they accept that that is part of the solution. When Germany passed a law to fine social media companies up to €50 million for failing to take down abusive content within 24 hours of its being reported, Facebook set up the content moderation centre in Germany, its largest in the world, and hired 1,200 moderators to staff it. That proves that it is possible to tackle online hate if the companies are willing to do so. When there is a financial incentive, they will hire people to remove abusive messages more quickly.

The Government need to stop cradling foreign tech giants and instead take action on online hate, so we are awaiting the online safety Bill and we will support the Government where they take the necessary action. We do feel that it has been too slow, so I ask the Minister whether she can tell us precisely when the Bill will come to the House and when we can crack on with work to support the new legislation.

This is not just about the big tech giants. It is about individuals and their being forced to take responsibility for their actions, and their corroding our democracy, corroding the lives of women who are trying to do their best in whichever area of public life, forcing them to step away from public life, and therefore damaging our democracy. It should not take the death of a young woman on the streets for us to start talking about street harassment towards women. It should not take someone taking their own life because of the online abuse that they have received for us to start talking about online harassment and abuse. This is an issue that is happening now. The Government need to start taking urgent action to deal with it, and we will support them in that urgent action.

The Chair of the Select Committee talked in her speech about abuse that starts online and then becomes physical. It is bad enough to be bullied online and bullied out of public life. We cannot take the risk that that will go further. I therefore challenge male MPs to start taking this more seriously and to start understanding the ferocity and the level of the abuse that women face. I will work with the Minister on the online safety Bill to give maximum protection, for the sake of women everywhere and for the sake of our democracy.

[Ian Paisley (in the Chair)]

Before I call the Minister, I thank every single Member who has contributed to what has been a powerful debate. These things needed to be said, and they have been very well said.

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[Caroline Dinenage]

That is such an important point, and it is actually something that I was thinking about as I was listening to the contributions to the debate. I took an almost conscious decision not to put my children on my social media, for that very reason. I do not want what I do as a job to have an impact on them. How messed up and crazy is it that we feel that we cannot share things about our lives because of the impact that it will have? Of course, that has a dramatic impact on democracy when it puts people off standing for election at every single level. That affects women and stops their voices being heard in this Chamber and in society more broadly. As other Members have said, our success as a Parliament utterly depends on our having elected figures who better reflect the communities that we represent.

I know there are organisations that have led studies on abuse targeted at women, such as Glitch, Amnesty International and the Centenary Action Group. This work has such an important role to play in strengthening our understanding of the scale and prevalence of abuse targeted at women representatives and others, and my Department has been supporting research led by the University of Sheffield that assessed online abuse during the 2019 general election campaign and the covid-19 lockdown. The findings suggested that abuse directed at MPs has increased. I think we all recognise that. From the 2017 and 2019 general elections it was clear that there are some MPs who are more affected, and that particularly includes, as the hon. Member for East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow (Dr Cameron) said, those with intersectionality. Women from minority backgrounds were particularly targeted. Bizarrely, as we have been sitting here I have noticed that a colleague in Parliament has tweeted:

“Today’s mailbag with photos and photos of beheadings that would make you sick. It’s not unusual for MPs to be dealing with racists and this stuff isn’t new to me, but today I feel exhausted.”

I think that we all feel exhausted by it, Mr Paisley.

As the hon. Member for Jarrow (Kate Osborne) said, the additional research shows that over the lockdown period individuals, and prominent women in particular, were still receiving high levels of abuse. It has got significantly worse. Of the 26 MPs who received sexist abuse only four were men, with women receiving high volumes of personal attacks—attacks on their credibility, and sexually explicit abuse. Although men are a greater proportion of MPs, women get much higher volumes of abuse, which is of course unacceptable. There is some support for Members in managing their online and offline security through the parliamentary channels, but of course much more needs to be done at that level.

All that only goes to underline how vital the Government’s online safety Bill is. It will protect women and all users online. We published the full Government response to the Online Harms White Paper consultation last year, outlining our fundamental commitment to taking forward a new legal duty of care that companies will have towards their users. That will mean that companies must have robust systems and processes in place to tackle illegal content, including illegal online abuse and anonymous abuse. They will need to remove content quickly, or face enforcement action from Ofcom, which will be the new regulator. Companies with the largest audience and the most high-risk features will have to address legal but harmful content for both adults and children. That will include online abuse that does not cross criminal thresholds but is still harmful for users and could leave a significant impact on victims.

Companies will also need to ensure that they have effective, accessible mechanisms through which users can report concerns about harmful content. That has always been a big issue. People do not know how to report such things. It is all very murky and needs to be much clearer. They need to be able to challenge wrongful content take-down as well, and raise concerns that a company has failed to fulfil its duty of care.

I understand clearly, and sympathise enormously with, calls for compulsory user verification for social media, which my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton North East (Jane Stevenson) raised. However, there are concerns that it would prevent legitimate users such as human rights activists or whistleblowers from protecting themselves, dissuade vulnerable users such as victims of domestic violence from seeking support, or deter young LGBT people who are not ready to come out to their friends and family from seeking the information and support they need. However, I am keen to look at imaginative and innovative ways to tackle the issue. There must be some way to square the circle. I would gently like to say that online platforms do not have to wait for legislation to move on the matter. If they want to put it right, they could start to put their houses in order now, to rebuild the trust. Surely they have a moral duty not to stand by and let such things continue to happen.

We are working at pace to prepare the Bill. It will be ready later in the year. The hon. Member for City of Chester (Christian Matheson) asked me about that and we want to get it out as soon as possible. It is, however, vital to get it right, and we want all parliamentarians to contribute to that important work.

I want quickly to mention our work with the Law Commission and how the criminal law will improve protection for women and users online. It is reviewing how the criminal law relates to harmful online communication and has consulted on reforms that include new ways to tackle pile-on abuse, cyber-flashing and self-harm. I know that that will be of interest to Members. The final recommendations will be published this summer and we are looking at where it would be appropriate to bring those things into law.

Finally, the Government will in due course legislate for a new electoral sanction that will help to protect women who contribute to our public life from intimidation and abuse, in person and online. That means that someone convicted of intimidating a candidate, future candidate, campaigner or elected representative will be banned from standing for or holding elected office for five years. That new sanction is just one part of the Government’s programme of work against political intimidation. We are working with partners to provide security guidance to support the elections that are coming up next month, ensuring the delivery of a safe and inclusive democratic event.

This Government are absolutely committed to protecting female representatives, both online and offline. The disproportionate abuse that women receive online, which we have heard about today, has absolutely no place in a thriving and tolerant democracy. We will do all we can to protect not only women representatives, but all users, as part of the online safety Bill. We are working at pace to deliver the new electoral sanctions and to prepare that legislation, and we will ensure that Members across both Houses can contribute to those vital pieces of work.

[Ian Paisley (in the Chair)]

We normally have to rise at five to the hour, but I will give Mrs Maria Miller one minute to wind up.