Online Pornography: Age Verification

Lord McNally Excerpts

Thursday 17th October 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran]

I am glad that the noble Lord supports the duty of care approach, as set out in the online harms White Paper. I think all sides of the House can agree that a voluntary approach has not worked to date. In terms of the administrative oversight, that is still the reason for the original delay.

[Lord McNally (LD)]

My Lords, there is an old way of testing a Statement—look at who is smiling and who is not. Is the Minister aware that this Statement will bring profound disappointment to many, including many in this House, who worked long and hard to get a system that would work, and work now, into the Bill? We were promised this for next month. Her colleague who answered my question on 30 September said:

“Policymakers around the world are watching the code’s progress and waiting to follow our lead”.—[Official Report, 30/09/19; col. 1556.]


Our lead is to now postpone this protective measure for at least three years. The Government should be ashamed of themselves.

[Baroness Barran]

I do not think that anyone is smiling about this. I hope the noble Lord will accept that. Dealing with online pornography is not a smiling matter. Clearly, both the Secretary of State and the Minister in the other place reflected long and hard before making this decision. They genuinely believe that by applying a more comprehensive approach we can end up with a better result for our children and grandchildren.