Online Safety Bill

Luke Pollard Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 19th April 2022 Commons Chamber

[Luke Pollard (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Lab/Co-op)]

I welcome the Bill. It is an important step forward, and it is because I welcome it that I want to see it strengthened. It seems to be an opportunity for us to get this right and in particular to learn lessons from where we have got it wrong in the past. I want to raise two different types of culture. The first is incel culture, and I would like to relate that to the experience that we had in Keyham, with the massing shooting in Plymouth last year, and the second is the consequences of being Instafamous.

It is just over six months since the tragic shooting in Keyham in which we lost five members of our community. The community feels incredibly strongly that we want to learn the lessons, no matter how painful or difficult they are, to ensure that something like this never happens again. We are making progress, working with the Home Office on gun law changes, in particular on linking medical records and gun certificates. One part is incredibly difficult, and that is addressing incel culture, which has been mentioned from the Front Bench by my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones) and by the hon. Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy). It sits in the toxic underbelly of our internet and in many cases, it sits on those smaller platforms to which this Bill will not extend the full obligations. I mention that because it results in real-world experiences.

I cannot allocate responsibility for what happened in the Keyham shooting because the inquest is still under way and the police investigations are ongoing, but it is clear that online radicalisation contributed to it, and many of the sites that are referenced as smaller sites that will not be covered by the legislation contributed perhaps in part to the online radicalisation.

When incel culture leads to violence it is not domestic terrorism; it falls between the stools. It must not fall between the stools of this legislation, so I would be grateful if the Minister agreed to meet me and members of the Keyham community to understand how his proposals relate to the learnings that we are coming out with in Keyham to make sure that nothing like this can ever happen again. With the online radicalisation of our young men in particular, it is really important that we understand where the rescue routes are. This is not just about the legislation; it needs to be about how we rescue people from the routes that they are going down. I would like to understand from the Minister how we can ensure that there are rescue routes; that schools, social services and mental health providers can understand how to rescue people from incel culture and the online radicalisation of incel culture as well as US gun culture—the glorification of guns and the misogynistic culture that exists in this space.

The second point about culture is an important one about how we learn from young people. Plymouth is a brilliant place. It is home to both GOD TV—a global evangelical broadcaster—and to many porn production companies. It is quite an eclectic, creative setting. We need to look at how we can learn from the culture of being Instafamous. Instafamous is something that many of our young people look at from an early age. They look at Body Beautifuls, Perfect Smiles—an existence that is out of reach for many people. In many cases they are viewing the creation of online pornography via sites such as OnlyFans as a natural and logical extension to being Instafamous. It is something that, sadly, can attract a huge amount of income. So young people taking their kit off at an early age, especially in their teenage years, can produce high earnings. I want to see those big companies challenged not to serve links on Instagram profiles to OnlyFans content for under-18s. That sits in a grey area of the Bill. I would be grateful if the Minister looked at how we can have that as a serious setting so that we can challenge that culture and help build understanding about how Instafamous must mean consent and protection.