Digital Economy Bill (Sixth sitting)

Debate between Thangam Debbonaire and Christian Matheson

Committee Debate: 6th sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 20th October 2016 Public Bill Committees

[Christian Matheson]

Yes. I raised this with the gentleman from the British Board of Film Classification, I believe, and I questioned his assertion about the top 50 websites. He said that the process would not stop there but proceed to the next 50, but if those 50 content providers are constantly moving all over the place, it will be rather like a game of whack-a-mole. Unless we have a sufficiently large mallet to give the mole a whack early on—[Interruption.] This is a serious business, and if I am sounding a bit jocular, that is not meant to take away from the serious issue. If we do not have the tools to address those who are deliberately not complying, and those who do not wish to comply with the regulations that we are putting in place to protect our children, I fear that we will be chasing after them too much.

My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Heeley is right that there will also be the danger that investigative authorities use too many of their resources to go after this, when there are other things they need to go after as well. We need to put the tools at the disposal of the investigative and enforcement authorities, to give them the opportunity to make as clean an attack as possible on the providers that are not complying with the desire of this House.

[Thangam Debbonaire]

I will return to the evidence on this point to make clear why I support what the hon. Member for Devizes is trying to do. In his evidence last week, the NSPCC’s Alan Wardle—I think I have got that right—said quite clearly:

“I think that is why the enforcement part is so important…so that people know that if they do not put these mechanisms in place there will be fines and enforcement notices, the flow of money will be stopped and, crucially, there is that backstop power to block if they do not operate as we think they should in this country. The enforcement mechanisms are really important to ensure that the BBFC can do their job properly and people are not just slipping from one place to the next.”––[Official Report, Digital Economy Public Bill Committee, 11 October 2016; c. 47, Q108.]

So what my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Heeley has just said is summed up very well by the NSPCC in its official evidence, and I hope that the Minister will have an answer for the NSPCC as well as for this Committee.