Protection of Children (Digital Safety and Data Protection) Bill

Debate between Melanie Ward and Chris Bryant

2nd reading
Friday 7th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Chris Bryant]

I think it was John Prescott who said something about ancient values in a modern setting. As we move forward, we need to secure the liberty of the individual at the same time as we protect the vulnerable.

My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West (Katie White) made the point that she has had twice as much correspondence on this subject as on any other this year. She made a really important point, which applies not only to this area, but to many other areas in which we work with young people: if we possibly can, it is very important to be able to extend the years of childhood that a child gets to enjoy. Many years ago, I wrote a report about teenage pregnancy in my constituency. That is another aspect of trying to ensure that where children delay their first sexual experience, it is almost certainly better for them and leads to better personal, social and other outcomes.

My hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire Dales (John Whitby) made a point about children attending A&E with psychiatric conditions. I urge him to be slightly cautious about the statistics here, because the work that I have done on acquired brain injuries suggests that sometimes people are actually presenting with a brain injury, rather than a psychiatric condition. That is one of the areas where we need to be much more intelligent about how we get data that informs our research.

We heard from the hon. Member for Esher and Walton (Monica Harding)—incidentally, I see “Esher and Walton” written down and think, “That must be a Conservative Member of Parliament,” so it is such a delight when I find that it is not.

[Melanie Ward]

In my constituency and across my area of Fife we have a real problem with violence and aggression in schools. Every week for the last month there has been a violent attack by children on children, and on almost every occasion it is filmed, shared on social media and amplified. Does the Minister agree that that is a real reason why we need action?

[Chris Bryant]

My hon. Friend makes an extremely good point. The use of a mobile phone as another form of aggression is a very disturbing part of the trend we have seen. She is quite right that we need to consider action in that field.

The hon. Member for Esher and Walton referred to services that are “inherently addictive by design”. I think there is actually a contradiction in terms there. They are not inherently addictive; they are addictive by design. Those are two quite different things. We should strive to achieve no services provided for children being addictive by design, which is precisely one of the things that the Government are determined about.

I should say to the right hon. Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse) that I indicated earlier that I had had no meetings with tech by making a zero with my fingers, but that is not quite true. I had a meeting a few months ago with Baroness Jones and TikTok, although I expressed as strongly as many Members have in this debate the kind of views that they have in relation to the operation of TikTok. It is not that I have been convinced by TikTok—if anything, we were trying to put the argument to it about the need for responsible activity in this field.