Question

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment she has made of the potential risk of the proposed under-16 social media ban increasing children's exposure to misogynist and extremist rhetoric through migration to unregulated online spaces; and what steps her Department is taking to ensure that the Government's violence against women and girls strategy accounts for the harms arising from those spaces.

Tackling violence against women and girls remains a top priority for this government.

The banning of social media companies from offering their services to under-16s will help provide additional protections for children. Alongside this, the former Secretary of State wrote to the Ofcom Chair, asking them to make robust enforcement a priority, including working with government to implement all remaining duties from the Online Safety Act and moving to swift and rigorous enforcement where it is appropriate. Under the Act, services are required to prevent children in the UK from encountering harmful content including adjusting algorithms and provide age-appropriate experiences.