Online Harms White Paper

Rachel Maclean Excerpts

Monday 8th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

I certainly hope the hon. Gentleman will not have to wait months. He raises fair concerns, and I have indicated that the Government are not blind to them. This particular White Paper does not deal with that subject, but the Government will produce very shortly a document that does.

[Rachel Maclean (Redditch) (Con)]

Of course, it is not just the tech giants that are active in the digital space; it is also our local papers. The Redditch Standard and the Redditch Advertiser, for example, do a fantastic job of holding us local politicians to account. Can the Secretary of State confirm that the welcome measures in the White Paper will not affect the ability of our small local papers, which do not have a massive resource base, to do their job?

[Jeremy Wright]

I can confirm that. We are concerned here with user-generated content, not with the activities of journalists or their editors. I would go further and say that it seems to me that the press—both local and national—and recognised journalists who do a good job of producing authoritative, sourced work are part of the solution, not part of the problem, particularly to the disinformation that has been identified across the House as one of the fundamental harms we are concerned about.