Oral Answers to Questions

Liz Twist Excerpts

Thursday 18th April 2024 Commons Chamber

[Stuart Andrew]

The hon. Lady has raised an important point, as have other Members. The Government are leading work on concussion in particular. We have worked with stakeholders and developed the first guidelines to be distributed to the grassroots, which have also aided professional sports. The evaluation of this is ongoing and will be invaluable in helping us to improve sport-related education and health. We have also convened a sports concussion research group to identify the questions that still need answering, as well as an innovation and technology panel, whose members are looking at the practical, technical solutions that will aid safety and mitigate concussion. However, as I have said, this is an incredibly important area and one on which we will focus.

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

12. What her planned timetable is for responding to the consultation on the statutory levy on gambling operators.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Stuart Andrew)]

The statutory levy represents a generational change in funding arrangements, and we have to consider properly the evidence provided during the consultation. We will publish a response setting out our final decision soon, but we remain on track to introduce the levy via secondary legislation this summer.

[Liz Twist]

It has been months since the consultation closed, with no response, and about 10 other consultations relating to the White Paper are also awaiting a response. Is the Minister trying to kick change into the long grass, and if not, will he please confirm when the responses will be published?

[Stuart Andrew]

I reject that accusation. There are 62 proposals in the White Paper, half of which will be finalised as a result of the consultation or are complete. A further three consultations have ended, and we are now analysing those. The levy is a priority, because we want the funds to be directed where they are needed most, on the basis of evidence, and we are working at pace to ensure that happens. I also point out that it was this Government who introduced it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lucy Frazer]

I am very pleased to congratulate Portsmouth football club on its success. My hon. Friend is absolutely right to highlight the importance of local clubs and what they do in their communities. It is not just the match on a Saturday; it is also about what they do to encourage people to get involved in their community and to get fit and active. Going around the country, I have seen some fabulous examples of what sports clubs—not just football but rugby and cricket—do for their local areas.

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

T6.   The Carney review revealed that women’s football has a long way to go on minimum professional standards, union representation, mental health support and more. Will Ministers give these recommendations parity with the changes needed in the men’s game?

[Lucy Frazer]

I am pleased to have spoken to Karen Carney on a number of occasions about her review and the importance of women’s football, and I am also pleased to take on board all her recommendations. The Government approved all the review’s recommendations, and I am pleased to chair the first implementation group, which is ensuring that the recommendations will be implemented by the Football Association and others.

Oral Answers to Questions

Liz Twist Excerpts

Thursday 22nd February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Stuart Andrew]

It sounds as if I need to have a cross-Shropshire meeting to discuss facilities in that area. We have been clear about the funding provided for swimming pools. As part of our strategy and determination to get more people active, we will be doing a piece of work to understand the location of black spots where we need to do more to provide more facilities and what those facilities should be to address local needs.

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

7. What steps her Department is taking to help support charities with increases in the cost of living.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Stuart Andrew)]

The Government have invested millions of pounds to support charities across England with the cost of living pressures, including the £76 million community organisations cost of living fund, which has now awarded all funding to frontline services helping vulnerable households.

[Liz Twist]

Charities across my constituency in Blaydon do an amazing job in supporting people and communities in what are really difficult times. Today, a triple threat of rising costs, falling income and higher demand has created what the National Council for Voluntary Organisations has called a cost of giving crisis, with half of all charities saying they are at full capacity and some having to turn people away. What further steps can the Government take to ensure charities can continue with their vital work?

[Stuart Andrew]

Having been a head of fundraising for a charity, I recognise the position charities face when donations fall at the minute they need to help more people. That is why we have provided £100 million in funding and added another £76 million from dormant assets to help charities in that difficult situation.

Oral Answers to Questions

Liz Twist Excerpts

Thursday 11th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Stuart Andrew]

How could I possibly resist such an invitation? It is always a great honour to open facilities in this role, and I am delighted that we are so busy that we are opening thousands of them.

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

4. What steps her Department is taking to support local journalism.

[The Minister for Media, Tourism and Creative Industries (Julia Lopez)]

We recognise that local media face serious challenges to their sustainability. Our digital markets legislation will help to rebalance the relationship between publishers and platforms, and the Government have been exploring the role of the BBC in local news through the mid-term charter review. We continue to consider all possible options in the interest of promoting and sustaining local newspapers, because we think they are vital pillars of the community and of a thriving democracy.

[Liz Twist]

Low pay and job insecurity are rife in local journalism. There have recently been big redundancies at my local paper, the Evening Chronicle, which has lost a third of its news reporters and half its sports reporters over a two-year period, meaning that my constituents get less local news, less coverage of emergency incidents and less coverage of their beloved sports teams. What further steps will the Minister take to address the issue of retaining careers in local journalism?

[Julia Lopez]

I thank the hon. Lady for raising these issues. I know that sustaining a good, financially beneficial career is a concern for many people working in journalism. Before I went on leave, I met Reach and other local newspaper groups to talk about some of the challenges they face. The Government are doing what we can through our ad spend, and we have looked at various things over the years, including zero rating of VAT, rates relief and so on, to try to help the sustainability of the local newspaper model. Ultimately, sustainability is at the heart of the challenge of giving local journalists places to have good careers. We are encouraging the BBC’s local democracy reporting service, which gives journalists opportunities beyond local newspapers.

Oral Answers to Questions

Liz Twist Excerpts

Thursday 15th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Stuart Andrew]

I am happy to say that we are mindful of the great contribution that horse-racing makes to this country’s economy, and it is followed throughout the world. We are doing the review into the levy. We are speaking to the industry and asking for its evidence, so that we can make a considered decision.

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

5. What discussions she has had with the BBC on the proposed changes to local radio services.

[Richard Foord (Tiverton and Honiton) (LD)]

17. What discussions she has had with the BBC director general on planned changes to local radio services.

[The Minister for Media, Tourism and Creative Industries (Sir John Whittingdale)]

I remain disappointed that the BBC is planning to reduce part of its local radio output. This is a matter for the BBC. Ministers met the BBC chair and director general towards the end of last year to express our concerns about their plans, as did I in a previous capacity in this House. I will raise the issue again when I meet the BBC director general soon.

[Liz Twist]

Local radio services are vital to our local communities, especially for those with visual impairments or older people who may not make the shift to online. This will really disadvantage them, and there does not seem to have been any equality impact assessment done. Will the Minister join me in asking the BBC to scrap these plans or, at the very least, pause them, so that such an assessment can be done and there can be further discussions?

[Sir John Whittingdale]

The BBC is under a duty under the charter to serve local communities. Obviously, how it delivers that is a matter for the BBC, but it is also subject to the oversight of Ofcom. I understand exactly the point that the hon. Lady makes, and I encourage her to continue to put it to the BBC.

Online Safety Bill

Liz Twist Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 5th December 2022 Commons Chamber

[John Penrose]

Addressing that is absolutely essential. That goes for any of the deepfake examples we have heard about, including from my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Dame Maria Miller), because if we know that something has been changed—and the whole point about deepfake is that it is hard to tell—we can tell easily and say, “I know that is not right, I know that is not true, I know that is false, and I can aim away from it and treat it accordingly”.

Just to make sure that everybody understands, this is not some piece of new tech magic; it is already established. Adobe, as I have said, is doing it with the Content Authenticity Initiative, which is widely backed by other very serious tech firms. Others in the journalism world are doing the same thing, with the Journalism Trust Initiative. There is NewsGuard, which produces trust ratings; the Trust Project, which produces trust indicators; and we of course have our own press regulators in this country, the Independent Press Standards Organisation and IMPRESS.

I urge the Government and all here present not to be satisfied with where this Bill stands now. We have all heard how it can be improved. We have all heard that this is a new, groundbreaking and difficult area in which many other countries have not even got as far as we have, but we should not be in any way satisfied with where we are now. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright) said earlier that we need to approach this Bill in a spirit of being humble, and this is an area in which humility is absolutely essential. I hope all of us realise how much further we have to go, and I hope the Minister will say how he proposes to address these important and so far uncovered issues in due course.

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

I wish to address new clauses 16 and 28 to 30, and perhaps make a few passing comments on some others along the way. Many others who, like me, were in the Chamber for the start of the debate will I suspect feel like a broken record, because we keep revisiting the same issues and raising the same points again and again, and I am going to do exactly that.

First, I will speak about new clause 16, which would create a new offence of encouraging or assisting serious self-harm. I am going to do so because I am the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on suicide and self-harm prevention, and we have done a good deal of work on looking at the issue of self-harm and young people in the last two years. We know that suicide is the leading cause of death in men aged under 50 years and females aged under 35 years, with the latest available figures confirming that 5,583 people in England and Wales tragically took their own lives in 2021. We know that self-harm is a strong risk factor for future suicidal ideation, so it is really important that we tackle this issue.

The internet can be an invaluable and very supportive place for some people who are given the opportunity to access support, but for other people it is difficult. The information they see may provide access to content that acts to encourage, maintain or exacerbate self-harm and suicidal behaviours. Detailed information about methods can also increase the likelihood of imitative and copycat suicide, with risks such as contagion effects also present in the online environment.

[Richard Burgon (Leeds East) (Lab)]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for the work she has done. She will be aware of the case of my constituent Joe Nihill, who at the age of 23 took his own life after accessing suicide-related material on the internet. Of course, we fully support new clause 16 and amendment 159. A lot of content about suicide is harmful, but not illegal, so does my hon. Friend agree that what we really need is assurances from the Minister that, when this Bill comes back, it will include protections to ensure that adults such as Joe, who was aged 23, and adults accessing these materials through smaller platforms are fully protected and get the protection they really need?

[Liz Twist]

I thank my hon. Friend for those comments, and I most definitely agree with him. One of the points we should not lose sight of is that his constituent was 23 years of age—not a child, but still liable to be influenced by the material on the internet. That is one of the points we need to take forward.

It is really important that we look at the new self-harm offence to make sure that this issue is addressed. That is something that the Samaritans, which I work with, has been campaigning for. The Government have said they will create a new offence, which we will discuss at a future date, but there is real concern that we need to address this issue as soon as possible through new clause 16. I ask the Minister to comment on that so that we can deal with the issue of self-harm straightaway.

I now want to talk about internet and media literacy in relation to new clauses 29 and 30. YoungMinds, which works with young people, is supported by the Royal College of Psychiatrists, the British Psychological Society and the Mental Health Foundation in its proposals to promote the public’s media literacy for both regulated user-to-user services and search services, and to create a strategy to do this. Young people, when asked by YoungMinds what they thought, said they wanted the Online Safety Bill to include a requirement for such initiatives. YoungMinds also found that young people were frustrated by very broad, generalised and outdated messages, and that they want much more nuanced information—not generalised fearmongering, but practical ways in which they can address the issue. I do hope that the Government will take that on board, because if people are to be protected, it is important that we have a more sophisticated media literacy than is reflected in the broad messages we sometimes get at present.

On new clause 28, I do believe there is a need for advocacy services to be supported by the Government to assist and support young people—not to take responsibilities away from them, but to assist and protect them. I want to make two other points. I see that the right hon. and learned Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright) has left the Chamber again, but he raised an interesting and important point about the size of platforms covered by the Bill. I believe the Bill needs to cover those smaller or specialised platforms that people might have been pushed on to by changes to the larger platforms. I hope the Government will address that important issue in future, together with the issue of age, so that protection does not stop just with children, and we ensure that others who may have vulnerabilities are also protected.

I will not talk about “legal but harmful” because that is not for today, but there is a lot of concern about those provisions, which we thought were sorted out and agreed on, suddenly being changed. There is a lot of trepidation about what might come in future, and the Minister must understand that we will be looking closely at any proposed changes.

We have been talking about this issue for many years—indeed, since I first came to the House—and during the debate I saw several former Ministers and Secretaries of State with whom I have raised these issues. It is about time that we passed the Bill. People out there, including young people, are concerned and affected by these issues. The internet and social media are not going to stop because we want to make the Bill perfect. We must ensure that we have something in place. The legislation might be capable of revision in future, but we need it now for the sake of our young people and other vulnerable people who are accessing online information.

[Suzanne Webb]

This is the first time I have been able to speak in the Chamber for some time, due to a certain role I had that prevented me from speaking in here. It is an absolute honour and privilege, on my first outing in some time, to have the opportunity to speak specifically to new clause 53, which is Zach’s law. I am delighted and thrilled that the Government are supporting Zach’s law. I have supported it for more than two years, together with my hon. Friend the Member for Watford (Dean Russell). We heard during the Joint Committee on the Draft Online Safety Bill how those who suffer from epilepsy were sent flashing images on social media by vile trolls. Zach Eagling, whom the law is named after, also has cerebral palsy, and he was one of those people. He was sent flashing images after he took part in a charity walk around his garden. He was only nine years of age.

Zach is inspirational. He is selflessly making a massive difference, and the new clause is world-leading. It is down to Zach, his mum, the UK Epilepsy Society, and of course the Government, that I am able to stand here to talk about new clause 53. I believe that the UK Epilepsy Society is the only charity in the world to change the law on any policy area, and that is new clause 53, which is pretty ground-breaking. I say thank you to Zach and the Epilepsy Society, who ensured that I and my hon. Friend the Member for Watford stepped up and played our part in that.

Being on the Joint Committee on the Draft Online Safety Bill was an absolute privilege, with the excellent chairmanship of my hon. Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Damian Collins). People have been talking about the Bill’s accompanying Committee, which is an incredibly good thing. In the Joint Committee we talked about this: we should follow the Bill through all its stages, and also once it is on the statute books, to ensure that it keeps up with those tech companies. The Joint Committee was brought together by being focused on a skill set, and on bringing together the right skills. I am a technological luddite, but I brought my skills and understanding of audit and governance. My hon. Friend the Member for Watford brought technology and all his experience from his previous day job. As a result we had a better Bill by having a mix of experience and sharing our expertise.

This Bill is truly world leading. New clause 53 is one small part of that, but it will make a huge difference to thousands of lives including, I believe, 600,000 who suffer from epilepsy. The simple reality is that the big tech companies can do better and need to step up. I have always said that we do not actually need the Bill or these amendments; we need the tech companies to do what they are supposed to do, and go out and regulate their consumer product. I have always strongly believed that.

During my time on the Committee I learned that we must follow the money—that is what it is all about for the tech companies. We have been listening to horrific stories from grieving parents, some of whom I met briefly, and from those who suffered at the hands of racism, abuse, threats—the list is endless. The tech companies could stop that now. They do not need the Bill to do it and they should do the right thing. We should not have to get the Bill on to the statute books to enforce what those companies should be doing in the first place. We keep saying that this issue has been going on for five years. The tech companies know that this has been talked about for five years, so why are they not doing something? For me the Bill is for all those grieving families who have lost their beautiful children, those who have been at the mercy of keyboard warriors, and those who have received harm or lost their lives because the tech companies have not, but could have, done better. This is about accountability. Where are the tech companies?

I wish to touch briefly on bereaved parents whose children have been at the mercy of technology and content. Many families have spent years and years still unable to understand their child’s death. We must consider imposing transparency on the tech companies. Those families cannot get their children back, but they are working hard to ensure that others do not lose theirs. Data should be given to coroners in the event of the death of a child to understand the circumstances. This is important to ensure there is a swift and humane process for the coroner to access information where there is reason to suspect that it has impacted on a child’s death.

In conclusion, a huge hurrah that we have new clause 53, and I thank the Government for this ground-breaking Bill. An even bigger hurrah to Zach, Zach’s mum, and the brilliant Epilepsy Society, and, of course, to Zach’s law, which is new clause 53.

Online Harms

Liz Twist Excerpts

Wednesday 26th October 2022 Westminster Hall

[Damian Hinds]

I shall accelerate in that case. The third area I want to mention, from my previous role as Security Minister, is disinformation. I welcome what is called the bridge that has been built between the Online Safety Bill and the National Security Bill to deal specifically with state-sponsored disinformation, which has become a tool of war. That probably does not surprise anybody, but I am afraid that, for states with a hostile intention, it can become, and is, a tool in peacetime. Quite often, it is not necessarily even about spreading untruths—believe it or not—but just about trying to wind people up and make them dislike one another more in an election, referendum or whatever it may be. This is important work.

Health disinformation, which we were exercised about during the coronavirus pandemic, is slated to be on the list of so-called legal but harmful harms, so the Bill would also deal with that. That brings me to my central point about the hardest part of this Bill: the so-called legal but harmful harms. I suggest that we actually call them “harmful but legal”, because that better captures their essence, as our constituents would understand it. It is a natural reaction when hearing about the Online Safety Bill, which will deal with stuff that is legal, to say, “Well, why is there a proposed law going through the British Parliament that tries to deal with things that are, and will stay, legal? We have laws to give extra protection to children, but adults should be able to make their own choices. If you start to interfere with that, you risk fundamental liberties, including freedom of speech.” I agree with that natural reaction, but I suggest that we have to consider a couple of additional factors.

First, there is no hard line between adults and children in this context. There is not a 100%—or, frankly, even 50%—reliable way of being able to tell who is using the internet and whether they are above or below age 18. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport (Dame Caroline Dinenage), among others, has been round the loop many times looking at age verification and so-called age assurance. It is very difficult. That is why a couple of weeks ago a piece of Ofcom research came out that found 32%—a third—of eight to 17-year-old social media users appear to be over 18. That is why a couple of weeks ago a piece of Ofcom research came out that found 32%—a third—of eight to 17-year-old social media users appear to be over 18. Why is that? Because it is commonplace for someone to sign up to TikTok or Snapchat with the minimum age of 13 when they are 10. They must give an age above 13 to be let in. Let us say that that age limit was set at 14; that means that when they are 14, it thinks they are 18—and so it carries on, all the way through life.

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

The right hon. Member and many other Members present will know that leading suicide prevention charities, including Samaritans and the Mental Health Foundation, are calling on the Government to ensure that the Online Safety Bill protects people of all ages from all extremely dangerous suicide and self-harm content. The right hon. Member makes very good points about age and on the legal but harmful issue. I hope very much that the Government will look at this again to protect more people from that dangerous content.

[Damian Hinds]

I thank the hon. Lady; I think her point stands on its own.

The second additional factor I want to put forward, which may sound odd, is that in this context there is not a hard line between what is legal and what is not. I mentioned emoji abuse. I am not a lawyer, still less a drafter of parliamentary legislation—there are those here who are—but I suggest it will be very hard to legislate for what constitutes emoji abuse in racism. Take something such as extremism. Extremist material has always been available; it is just that it used to be available on photocopied or carbon-copied sheets of paper. It was probably necessary to go to some draughty hall somewhere or some backstreet bookshop in a remote part of London to access it, and very few people did. The difference now is that the same material is available to everyone if they go looking for it; sometimes it might come to them even if they do not go looking for it. I think the context here is different.

This debate—not the debate we are having today, but the broader debate—is sometimes conducted in terms that are just too theoretical. People sometimes have the impression that we will allow these companies to arbitrarily take down stuff that is legal but that they just do not like—stuff that does not fit with their view of the world or their politics. On the contrary, the way the Bill has been drafted means that it will require consistency of approach and protect free speech.

I am close to the end of my speech, but let us pause for a moment to consider the sorts of things we are talking about. My right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Ms Dorries) made a written ministerial statement setting out an indicative list of the priority harms for adults. They are abuse and harassment—not mere disagreement, but abuse and harassment—the circulation of real or manufactured intimate images without the subject’s consent; material that promotes self-harm; material that promotes eating disorders; legal suicide content; and harmful health content that is demonstrably false, such as urging people to drink bleach to cure cancer.

I suggest that when people talk about free speech, they do not usually mean those kinds of things; they normally mean expressing a view or being robust in argument. We have the most oppositional, confrontational parliamentary democracy in the world, and we are proud of our ability to do better, to make better law and hold people to account through that process, but that is not the same thing as we are talking about here. Moreover, there is a misconception that the Bill would ban those things; in fact, the Bill states only that a service must have a policy about how it deals with them. A helpful Government amendment makes it clear that that policy could be, “Well, we’re not dealing with it at all. We are allowing content on these things.”

There are also empowerment tools—my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Siobhan Baillie) may say more about that later in relation to anonymity—but we want users to be in control. If there is this contractual relationship, where it is clearly set out what is allowed in this space and someone signs up to it, I suggest that enhances their freedoms as well as their rights.

I recognise that there are concerns, and it is right to consider them. It may be that the Bill can be tightened to reassure everybody, while keeping these important protections. That might be around the non-priority areas, which perhaps people consider to be too broad. There might also be value in putting the list of priority harms in the Bill, so that people are not concerned that this could balloon.

As I said at the start, the Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe, knows more about this than probably any other living human being. He literally works tirelessly on it and is immensely motivated, for all the right reasons. I have probably not said anything in the past 10 minutes that he did not already know. I know it is a difficult job to square the circle and consider these tensions.

My main message to the Minister and the Government is, with all the work that he and others have done, please let us get on with it. Let us get the Bill into law as soon as possible. If changes need to be made to reassure people, then absolutely let us make them, but most of all, let us keep up the momentum.

Oral Answers to Questions

Liz Twist Excerpts

Thursday 7th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck (South Shields) (Lab)]

2. What recent assessment her Department has made of the impact of increases in the cost of living on charitable giving.

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

10. What assessment her Department has made of the impact of increases in the cost of living on charitable giving.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Nigel Huddleston)]

We understand that the pressures people are facing mean that some will not be able to give as much to charity as they have done in the past. However, while recent reports show a drop, average donations remain higher than pre covid, and total donations for the first quarter of 2022 look to be the highest since 2017, although this is due in large part to the incredible generosity of the British people in giving over £300 million towards the Ukrainian humanitarian appeal. I will continue to work closely with the sector on this important issue.

[Nigel Huddleston]

I gently remind the hon. Lady that the Opposition do not have a monopoly on sympathy and understanding. We completely understand the pressures that people are facing with the cost of living and have taken action to support families. That is why the Government are providing over £15 billion in further support targeted particularly at those with the greatest need. That is in addition to over £22 billion announced previously. Government support on the cost of living now totals £37 billion this year.

[Liz Twist]

I associate myself with the remarks by my hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mrs Lewell-Buck). That is the experience in my constituency too—food banks are suffering. Research by the Charities Aid Foundation found that 82% of charities are worried about how they are going to pay their utility bills, and many of them worry that they will not survive the crisis. What action are the Government taking to help our valuable charities to stay afloat?

[Nigel Huddleston]

During the pandemic, we showed how important charities were, with more than £750 million for the charity scheme. That showed that we needed them to survive, because they play such an important role in our society. I will continue to engage with charities and make representations to other parts of Government. We recognise the important role they play, but also we need to help families directly, which will then reduce the burden on the charities.

Football Index Collapse

Liz Twist Excerpts

Tuesday 7th June 2022 Westminster Hall

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the impact of the collapse of Football Index.

It is a pleasure to serve under you as Chair, Ms Ghani.

Football Index was a platform that allowed customers to create, buy and sell bets to one another as a means of making money, but it was, or was presented as, so much more than just betting. The “go to market” option on the platform allowed users to buy and trade with one another, creating an exchange market for customers. Due to the nature of the product, from its launch in 2015 it was advertised to customers repeatedly by Football Index as

“the world’s first football stock market”,

leading many to believe that this was more than just simple gambling and that it was a way of using their knowledge of football to grow a portfolio and make money. And on paper, in the early years, some did.

The collapse of Football Index has really damaged many customers. We have only to look at the tip of this iceberg to see stories from individuals who have lost so much as a result of the failings surrounding the company. The issue is more than money, vital though that is. The situation has also had an impact on many customers’ mental health and wellbeing. Despite the report published by Malcolm Sheehan QC in September 2021, there are still many unanswered questions, leaving the thousands of people affected without answers. This must be addressed to ensure that they have the answers they need. We must also, crucially, look again at the regulatory failing that allowed the situation to come about.

[Sir Greg Knight (East Yorkshire) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on securing the debate. Is she aware that in the previous Session of Parliament there was an early-day motion on this subject? It was tabled on 25 November by the right hon. Member for Knowsley (Sir George Howarth), who I see is in his place, and it called on the Government to implement the recommendations of Malcolm Sheehan QC, but it concludes by saying that it

“further calls on the Government to do all that it can to ensure that those owed money receive full reimbursement.”

Does the hon. Lady join me in supporting and repeating that request today?

[Liz Twist]

I thank the right hon. Member for his intervention. Certainly this debate is part of the ongoing campaign to ensure that justice is done, and I will touch on the issue of compensation and redress later in my speech.

[Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way on the point about fairness and justice. My constituent, Mr Murphy, lost £7,000 following the collapse of Football Index. Unbelievably, all that he has had back so far is £81, but for him and constituents like him, it is not about the money; it is justice that they want and deserve. He wanted me to say that he said this:

“I want the Directors responsible to be made accountable for their actions…I have seen nothing from the Government in terms of redress for customers or even how something like this can be prevented in the future.”

Does my hon. Friend agree that the Minister needs to tell us how this will be prevented from happening again, and what justice people can expect?

[Liz Twist]

I certainly agree and will touch immediately on the issue of redress. As I was saying, the issues identified must be addressed to ensure that those affected have the answers they need and we must look again at the regulatory failing that allowed this situation to come about. Tens of thousands of customers had—and lost—more than £124 million in the system at the point of its collapse. Of course the question of redress must be revisited, as hon. Members have already said, because the clear failings of the regulations applied to BetIndex Ltd, a subsidiary of Fame Ventures Ltd, have left many people in a difficult position.

The Sheehan report, as we have heard, highlights a range of issues about the regulation of the product; it highlights several failings by both the Gambling Commission and the Financial Conduct Authority. It sets out that from early in the life of Football Index, the product was not regulated correctly and the platform’s “go to market” function was not notified to the Gambling Commission. However, it states that the Gambling Commission had reviewed the product twice and this was not noted in the reviews carried out, meaning that Football Index was given its licence and launched without any consideration of one of its two main features. At that point, it was already clear that the Gambling Commission should have done more to protect the rights of customers. Given Football Index’s likeness to an exchange or a market, the Gambling Commission should have notified the Financial Conduct Authority.

The Sheehan report also states that the Gambling Commission became “fully aware” of the issues with Football Index in 2019, but it still allowed customers to put money into the platform, meaning that customers lost even more money because of the commission’s inaction.

In 2019 the Gambling Commission referred Football Index to the Financial Conduct Authority, and in September that year stated that Football Index should be authorised by both the FCA and the GC. Despite that, again nothing was put in place. Clearly, the failings allowed customers to bet more and more into a platform that was not correctly regulated. Now, in the aftermath, people are having to deal with the fear that they may never get back the money that they put into the platform. The life-changing impact that could have on some individuals is clear.

[Clive Lewis (Norwich South) (Lab)]

rose—

[Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)]

rose—

[Liz Twist]

I give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Streatham (Bell Ribeiro-Addy).

[Bell Ribeiro-Addy]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way and for making such a brilliant speech on an issue that has affected so many of our constituents. At the end of last year, I met my constituents who are victims of the Football Index collapse, and they shared with me details about the impact that the collapse has had on them financially. However, what they spoke about in most detail was the emotional impact and the damage to their mental health. Some felt ashamed or guilty for getting family members to invest and lose money in Football Index as well. Securing redress for the victims of the Football Index collapse is about more than just financial redress; it is also about giving them justice, given the emotional and psychological damage that the whole incident has caused. Does my hon. Friend agree?

[Liz Twist]

I most certainly agree. I know the real impact that the collapse has had on my constituents’ wellbeing—not just financially. My hon. Friend makes a valid point.

[Clive Lewis]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Liz Twist]

I will take one more intervention and then I must make progress.

[Clive Lewis]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way, and for making such a powerful speech and securing this debate.

I wanted to intervene at this point, when my hon. Friend is talking about the regulatory framework, because it has comprehensively failed my constituents, many of whom have been suicidal. The collapse has led to them losing their homes or their businesses. The FCA failed them, Football Index failed them and the Gambling Commission failed them.

The Government have ruled out financial redress. Would my hon. Friend say that, in the interests of justice —indeed, if justice is to be done—and in the interests of our constituents’ wellbeing, the Government must look at financial redress again?

[Liz Twist]

I most certainly agree. It is one of the asks that I will make of the Minister later. I will try to speed up, because I am aware that so many Members want to speak.

I have made the point about the regulators and the fact that, in effect, Football Index was allowed to operate as a stock market where people traded stocks. I will now talk about the experience of people such as Chris and Collin, who are my constituents. They have given me permission to share their experiences. They told me about the difficulties the collapse has caused in their lives. Chris was saving up for a wedding and now has limitations on what he can afford. He said that Football Index

“was advertised as a great way to invest and buy shares, it was shown to be a better way to save compared to the rates banks offer. The loss of the £13,000 has limited certain aspects of what we can afford now.”

Collin also lost an incredible amount of money through this regulatory failing, which has had a direct impact on his mental health. As a result, he spent months unable to work, because of the stress and depression caused by the collapse. He told me:

“I feel a massive sense of guilt and anger that a huge amount of my family savings has been stolen. That money could have been used for my children’s future, house improvements, holidays and other investments.”

That comment again touches on the issue of regulatory failing. Football Index was able to sell itself as the “football stock market”; the language used was very public and the company even sponsored football teams high up in the Football League system. Allowing customers to believe that was incredibly misleading. The Gambling Commission and the Financial Conduct Authority should have stepped in long before they did. Their failure to understand a licensed product led to Collin, Chris and many other people across the country losing thousands of pounds.

On 17 May, I wrote to the Minister about the experiences of my constituents, and fortuitously, I received a response to my letter yesterday by email. The Minister noted that the Gambling Commission and the FCA have acted on the recommendations of the Sheehan report, so there is clearly a recognition that there was a failure in the regulation of the product. It is clear that the regulators have failed many people, like Chris and Collin, and they and I believe that they should be compensated in some way for that failure. The Sheehan report itself admits that it was

“produced under significant time constraints”

and could not provide

“as full responses…as possible”

to the issues, yet even from that condensed outline of the issues, it is clear that the regulatory failings have cost thousands of people dearly.

I welcome the gambling White Paper announced by the Government, which will seek to better regulate the market, better protect customers, and learn the lessons of this failure. However, that is simply not enough for the tens of thousands affected by the collapse of Football Index—those who have lost such great amounts of money, who are worried about telling loved ones about lost savings and growing ever more pessimistic about the Government’s handling of the matter. Those people simply want one thing: justice. On a number of occasions, the Government have stepped in when regulators and companies have failed to ensure that people are protected, so my constituents and those of other hon. Members ask, “How is this situation different?”

The Football Index action group has repeatedly asked the Government to do more to seek redress for those affected, and is willing to discuss that request with the Government and work with them to find a solution that will work for the people affected. As such, my first ask is whether the Minister will commit today to a meeting with the Football Index action group and myself to further discuss these outstanding issues.

It is clear that the failings that surrounded Football Index were severe, and the impact they have had on people’s lives will be lifelong. For that reason, those affected deserve the answers they need to move on from the situation. Will the Minister commit to another, more in-depth report, or would he be supportive of an inquiry into those regulatory failings to show that the Government and Parliament support those affected, and want to work with them to find the crucial answers that those people need?

Since the collapse of Football Index in March 2021, the regulatory failings have become clear, and the tens of thousands of people affected have lost huge amounts of money to this scandal. For them, we need to do more than learn the lessons and look forward; we need to find answers, and compensate where possible. My final ask is that the Government look again at bringing forward a redress scheme for the victims of Football Index. My constituents Collin and Chris, who have been hit hard by their losses as a result of regulatory failings, and all the other people affected across the UK, deserve answers and redress.

--- Later in debate ---

[Liz Twist]

I thank every Member present, from every nation and every party, for being united in one object—seeking redress and making sure that things like this cannot happen again. I also thank all those Football Index “investors”—which is what they thought they were—for their help in this debate. I welcome the Minister’s assurance that he will refer my requests to the relevant Minister, and I look forward to hearing back directly, because there is ground for further discussion.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the impact of the collapse of Football Index.

Online Safety Bill

Liz Twist Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 19th April 2022 Commons Chamber

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

I welcome the Bill, which is necessary and overdue, but I would like to raise two issues: how the Bill can tackle suicide and self-harm prevention, and mental health around body image for young people.

First, all suicide and self-harm content should be addressed across all platforms, regardless of size: it is not just the larger platforms that should be considered. The requirement imposed on category 1 platforms relating to legal but harmful suicide and self-harm content should be extended to all platforms, as many colleagues have said. There is a real concern that users will turn from the larger to the smaller platforms, so the issue needs to be addressed. Will the Minister confirm that even smaller platforms will be asked at the start to do an assessment of the risk they pose?

Secondly, the Secretary of State referred to secondary legislation, which will be necessary to identify legal but harmful suicide and self-harm content as a real priority for action. It would be really helpful if we could see that before the legislation is finally passed: it is a key issue and must be an urgent area of work.

Thirdly, I wonder whether the Government will look again at the Law Commission’s proposal that a new offence of encouraging or assisting serious self-harm be created, and that the Bill should make assisting self-harm a priority issue with respect to illegal content. Will the Minister look again at that proposal as the Bill progresses?

I also want to speak about damage to body image, particularly in relation to young people. All of us want to look our best on social media. Young people in particular face a real barrage of digitally enhanced and in many cases unrealistic images that can have a negative effect on body image. Research by the Mental Health Foundation shows that harmful material that damages body image can have a real negative effect on young people’s mental health. As other hon. Members have said, and as most of us know from our own experience, many of the images that we see on social media are driven by algorithms that can amplify the harm to young people. That is particularly concerning as an issue associated with the possible development of eating disorders and mental health conditions.

The Bill does include some provision on algorithms, but more needs to be done to protect our young people from that damage. I encourage the Government to consider amendments that would give more control over new algorithmic content and ensure that the safest settings are the default settings. Users should be given more control over the kind of advertising that they see and receive, to avoid excessive advertising showing perfect bodies. The Government should commit themselves to recognising material that damages body image as a serious form of harm.

There are many more detailed issues that I would have liked to raise tonight, but let me end by saying that we need to give serious consideration to ways of reducing the incidence of suicides and self-harm.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

Draft Online Safety Bill Report

Liz Twist Excerpts

Thursday 13th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

I speak as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on suicide and self-harm prevention and intend to deal with those issues. Suicide remains a major public health problem, with the highest suicide rates among men aged 45 to 49. It is the biggest killer of young people aged 16 to 24 and the suicide rate for young women is now at its highest on record.

While suicide and self-harm are complex and rarely caused by one thing, in many cases, the internet is involved. A 2017 inquiry into suicides of young people found suicide-related internet use in nearly 26% of deaths in under-20s and 13% of deaths in 20 to 24-year olds. I therefore welcome the Committee’s report, in particular its recommendation that encouraging or assisting suicide be included in the primary legislation as a priority illegal harm.

Self-harm, which is a major risk for suicide, is also becoming much more prevalent, having tripled among young people in the last 15 years. One in 15 adults in England report that they have self-harmed. I also welcome the Committee’s recommendation, in line with the Law Commission’s, that encouraging or assisting a person to seriously self-harm should be made illegal.

While some harmful suicide content is illegal—and some self-harm content could be in future—there will be suicide and self-harm content that can be distressing, triggering and instructive, that can act in part to maintain or exacerbate self-harm and suicidal behaviours, and that is legal but harmful. Will the Minister confirm that suicide and self-harm will also be included as a priority legal but harmful content in the final Bill?

Samaritans has a longstanding concern that the draft Bill lets smaller platforms such as online community groups, forums and message boards, where some of the most harmful suicide and self-harm content can be found, completely off the hook, particularly when it comes to protecting adults. The Committee received written evidence from people who contacted Samaritans to share their lived experience of suicide. One respondent wrote:

“The people using the bigger sites will just flood the smaller sites if their content starts getting removed. The standard needs to be the same across all sites.”

Another wrote:

“If suicidal people can’t find what they are looking for at large sites they will just go on to the smaller sites so it doesn’t solve the problem.”

Eighteen years old is not a cut-off point for experiencing suicidal ideation, which can fluctuate over the course of a single day. Those who experience that are more likely to be more vulnerable and at greater risk of harm from legal but harmful suicide and self-harm content.

Another respondent with lived experience told the Committee:

“Harmful and accessible suicide and self-harm online content can be harmful at any age. I am in my fifties and would be tempted to act on this information if I felt suicidal again”.

Furthermore, it has been unclear whether Wikipedia, where some of the most harmful content can be found, would be in scope of the legislation. I therefore welcome the Committee’s recommendation that the categorisation of services in the draft Bill be overhauled and that all platforms consider the risk that their service poses in relation to children and adults.

There is a clear imperative to tackle suicide and self-harm content online. Taking a partial approach to such content will undermine the UK Government’s efforts to prevent suicide and to achieve the aims of the cross-Government national suicide prevention strategy in England. A key aspect of suicide prevention is the reduction of access to means, and reducing the availability of harmful and instructional information is one way of achieving that.

No caveats around tackling harmful suicide and self-harm content—size of platform, age of user—should be established that will diminish the legislation’s ability to tackle harmful content in this space. Can the Minister confirm in relation to suicide and self-harm content that all platforms and people of all ages will be in scope in the final Bill presented to this House?