Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Jeremy Hunt and Claire Perry

Thursday 9th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Claire Perry (Devizes) (Con)]

T6. Ministers will know that a group of concerned MPs and peers recently concluded a cross-party parliamentary inquiry into online child protection. Without wishing to front-run the conclusions of the report, it is clear that the current protections are failing. We know that 93% of women are extremely concerned about the ease with which online pornography can be accessed by children. The “active choice” response of the internet service providers targets only new customers and will not be rolled out fully until October. Given that 80% of British households are already ISP customers, does the Secretary of State really think that that response is enough? If he does not, what is he going to do about it?

[Mr Jeremy Hunt]

It is a great pleasure finally to hear from my hon. Friend. I have a great deal of sympathy for her point. She has campaigned assiduously on this issue. I do not want to pre-empt the Green Paper that we will publish shortly. I hope that that will address some of the concerns that she has raised.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Jeremy Hunt and Claire Perry

Thursday 16th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

When the Government came to office, just over £230 million had been allocated to broadband roll-out; that has now been increased to £830 million. It is still not enough, but we are determined to do what we can.

[Claire Perry]

The people of Wiltshire welcome the fact that they are among those receiving money in the next tranche of the high-speed broadband roll-out. However, high-speed, superfast broadband raises the spectre of children accessing inappropriate material on the internet more easily, which worries many parents. What pressure is the Minister putting on internet service providers to make access to internet porn an opt-in option? If that work fails, is he prepared to regulate to keep our children safe?

[Mr Hunt]

I can confirm that the Government take this issue incredibly seriously—the Bailey review on the sexualisation of youth is one indication of that. We are also having a meeting with the trade body United Kingdom Internet Sites to take the issue further. We believe strongly that internet service providers need to behave in a socially responsible way and to do what they can to protect children, so we fully support what my hon. Friend said.