Children and Families Bill

Lord Harris of Haringey Excerpts

Tuesday 28th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Benjamin]

My Lords, I support the amendment tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Howe, and I congratulate her on doing so because there are grave concerns about the damage being caused to children's mental, physical and moral well-being. Some children as young as six have been affected because of the inappropriate online adult material that they have been exposed to. Websites such as those containing sexual, self-harming or bullying content are taking their toll, as reported by children’s charities, educationalists, newspapers, politicians, religious leaders and child psychologists.

Some people are calling this concern a moral panic, but I call it a moral emergency. I hope that the Minister agrees that unless we do something soon we will have a lost generation of adults who have little understanding of what a healthy, joyful, loving and sexual relationship is, not to mention thousands of girls who will be psychologically damaged by their first sexual encounters with boys who have become addicted to porn since they were very young. These boys themselves are also damaged because psychologically and mentally they find that girls are not matching up to the warped sexual fantasy of the ones whom they see online. Then there are those children who self-harm or commit suicide. Sadly, there are such reports almost daily due to the sites young people are accessing.

I thank the Minister for preparing to revise the statutory guidance on safeguarding children’s personal safety online and protecting them from all inappropriate online content through PSHE. I also congratulate the Government on taking such a robust stance on working with the online industry to find solutions to this plague that is spreading among the nation’s children, many of which are having some effect. However, the amendment, to which I put my name, goes further as it compels ISPs and mobile phone companies to comply with the regulations rather than relying on self-regulation, because some have been found to be avoiding their responsibilities. Who else in the future will do just that?

As well as education for children and parents to help them deal with the dangers of the internet and to show them how to navigate their way about it safely, there need to be other techniques to achieve this. This amendment is another tool to use to do just that. There are arguments by those who fear filtering will threaten their rights and freedoms. But surely the protection and safeguarding of children’s mental, physical and moral well-being override all those.

We must all accept that the internet is both a wonderful resource as well as a place where evil lurks. We need to confront that boldly and strategically. I realise that this amendment has come late in the day to a full and wide Bill where many issues have been adopted generously by the Minister—and I thank him for that. But I also ask him fully and carefully to give consideration to this amendment to take a stance against those who are prepared to harm our children’s well-being.

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)]

My Lords, I support the noble Baroness, Lady Howe, and her amendment. I wish to make only one point because I associate myself fully with what she has said, and that is in favour of the recommendation in the amendment about robust age verification. The loop that she described of sending an e-mail to the purported address of the parent is simply inadequate.

Requiring robust age verification would mean that ISPs would have to find a way of doing this effectively. That would not only have a spin-off benefit in terms of child protection, but all sorts of other benefits where age verification would be helpful. Therefore, I hope that the Minister will be prepared to accept this amendment, particularly in the light of that point.