That this House has considered e-petition 661407 relating to children’s social media accounts.
It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Twigg.
It is a privilege to have the opportunity to open this important debate as a member of the Petitions Committee. I start by paying tribute to the petitioners and in particular the petition creator, Ellen Roome, who I had the honour of meeting as part of my preparations for this debate and who is in the Gallery today.
Ellen’s son, Jools, died in April 2022. Since then, she has been a determined campaigner not just to get access herself to Jools’ social media data to help understand the circumstances of his death, but also to secure a future in which other bereaved parents do not face the situation that she has. I welcome that Ellen’s MP, the hon. Member for Cheltenham (Max Wilkinson), is here, as is my hon. Friend the Member for Darlington (Lola McEvoy), who has been working with Ellen on this issue. I look forward in particular to their contributions, which I know will provide further insight and will rightly ensure that Ellen’s own words are on the parliamentary record.
Since Jools’ death in 2022, the law and practice related to social media data has changed in several ways, most notably through the Online Safety Act 2023. The changes were secured in large part thanks to the efforts of the Bereaved Families for Online Safety group, other members of which are also here today; I pay tribute to their work. What I hope will become clear in this debate is that recent changes to the law, the implementation of those changes and the response of social media companies are not yet sufficient, and further change is needed to help bereaved parents such as Ellen. The petition attracted 126,000 signatures. That is a testament to Ellen’s campaigning efforts and the public’s concern about these issues.
Online services such as social media, streaming and messaging are now features of everyday life, including children’s lives. There are undoubtedly positive aspects of age-appropriate online services—giving children opportunities to explore the world, connecting with others who share interests and extending peer support options—but as the level of public concern recognises, it is beyond doubt that there has been significant exposure of many children to online harms, and that the action in response to that has not yet been sufficient or fast enough to meet the challenges.
Ellen Roome has gone through the unimaginable; I am absolutely amazed at her ability to continue fighting for answers for her son Jools. Does the hon. Member agree that social media companies are not in the wild west of the internet age any more and have become an integrated part of our society with certain responsibilities? Does he also agree that one of those responsibilities is ensuring that children in Wokingham and across the UK are protected from harmful content?
I agree that social media companies rightly face regulation; I will talk a little more about that later.
There is, rightly, debate and campaigning in the media and elsewhere—we saw some of that over the weekend—about the level of regulation of online content that children may access online, whether that is illegal content or legal but harmful content. Although the regulation of content itself is not the focus of today’s debate, as a concerned parent myself, I am impatient for online services to take proper responsibility for what our children see. Social media companies must not shy away from their responsibilities to protect children, either because of misguided free speech concerns or out of concern about their levels of profit.
It is important to note, as context for today’s debate, that the law does not allow online services to collect or store the personal information of children under the age of 13. As a result, most popular services require users to be at least 13 years of age, but enforcement of that requirement has historically been lax. The age-assurance requirements in the Online Safety Act must be implemented without delay.
I know that hon. Members will want to touch on various elements of the approaches to social media regulation, but in parallel to the wider debate about content regulation, the petitioners are clear that there are specific issues about parental access that warrant a response in their own right, from both social media companies and the Government, so I want to focus my remarks, and I hope this debate, on those specific questions.
First, the petitioners call for parental access to social media when children are alive. I understand the instinct behind this call—the instinct to directly monitor what a child is doing online in order to protect them from the harms to which I have referred. However, in the course of preparing for the debate, I heard clearly from multiple perspectives, including children’s charities such as the NSPCC, that broad, overarching parental rights to children’s social media would not be appropriate. Of course, given that the minimum age of use should be 13, we are talking about teenagers. Children—teenagers—do have long-established rights to privacy, as set out by the UN convention on the rights of the child, and established UK law and practice in a range of areas reflects and recognises that.
We owe it to our constituents that we work together, and leave no stone unturned to understand the trends and drivers that lead our children to take their own lives. Social media companies headquartered overseas have repeatedly demonstrated that they cannot be relied on to take reasonable action out of good will, so I invite the hon. Member to agree that it is up to Parliament to legislate accordingly.
I agree that legislative action has been necessary, as the Online Safety Act shows, and indeed, there are provisions on this in the current data Bill. The issue is that there is a lack of clarity; under the existing law, some social media companies seem to be finding a way of doing the right thing while others are not. I will come to the hon. Member’s point when I ask a couple of questions of the Government.
I can assure the social media companies—in the event that they carefully do the right thing, on a case-by-case basis, and then face data protection questions from regulators in response—that they will find allies across Parliament in defending their actions.
I ask the Minister and the Government: what scope is there for stating clearly in law that, so long as due care is taken on a case-by-case basis, the release of data to bereaved parents is permitted? Could the data Bill be amended to include a clarification to remove, once and for all, the claim of some companies that they are prohibited from giving parents like Ellen the data and answers they deserve? Are there any other steps the Minister believes could be taken to right this injustice? I look forward to hearing the perspectives of colleagues and the Government’s response to this important debate.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Twigg. I thank the Petitions Committee for enabling this debate and the hon. Member for Sunderland Central (Lewis Atkinson) for opening it.
There is nothing any parent fears more than the loss of a child. Tragically, in 2022, Ellen Roome suffered this loss. Her world was shattered when she came home to find her son Jools not breathing. He had taken his own life aged just 14. While Ellen was dealing with the enormous pain of her loss, she also had questions about what had happened in the days, weeks and months leading up to Jools’ death. Jools was a happy boy. A video filmed just before his death shows him playing happily with friends. The absence of any hints that he might have been inclined to harm himself led Ellen’s search to his social media accounts.
In her search for answers, Ellen found herself blocked by a legal system unable to tackle the complexities of social media and obstructive social media giants that placed process ahead of compassion. The police had no reason to suspect a crime, so did not see a reason to undertake a full investigation into Jools’ social media. The inquest did not require a thorough analysis of Jools’ online accounts. None of the social media companies would grant Ellen access to Jools’ browsing data, citing regulations. A court order was needed to access his digital data, which required eye-watering legal fees.
Ellen sought nothing more than what amounts to access to her deceased child’s personal effects. In years gone by, that would have required searching through a child’s bedroom, perhaps looking at diaries, notes, letters, toy boxes, stickers or any other clues. The modern-day equivalent of such a search necessitates access to social media accounts, but because the law has not kept pace with the realities of modern life, that search has not been and cannot be completed. This is a cruel and inhumane process to impose on a grieving parent seeking nothing more than answers about what happened before their child took their own life. That is all Ellen wanted.
It is every parent’s worst nightmare to lose a child—imagine losing them and not knowing why they are gone. Ellen Roome is Jools’ mum. She deserves answers but, unbelievably, she is not allowed access to the data that might provide them, which is so wrong.
This petition is for Jools’ law, which would allow parents to have access to their child’s online data in specific circumstances. Jools Sweeney was hugely loved and is greatly missed by his family and community. In actuality, Jools’ law would present a small amendment of no more than 100 words to the Online Safety Act 2023; the amendment and Jools’ law would appear in section 101 of chapter 4, which is titled “Information powers and information notices”.
The Act currently outlines the powers that a senior coroner has in relation to instructing Ofcom to issue a notice to online platforms to provide data in relation to the death of a child. Section 101 of the Act will be amended by clause 122 of the Data (Use and Access) Bill to strengthen the powers that Ofcom has to prevent the deletion of a child’s data when a notice has been given and issued to the regulated platforms that the child has died.
The progress made in this policy area is testament to the parents of children who are no longer with us and to their incredible strength and work. I thank those present and those watching for everything they have done to protect our children. We need to build on this work to allow parents access to data without the need for a second inquest.
A further amendment would allow for Ofcom to be notified as a routine course of action in the event of future tragedies of child suicide or unexplained deaths. That would alleviate the risk of vital answers to parents’ inevitable questions being deleted, and mitigate the reality of it being solely the responsibility of the parents to request the data in those painful early days of grief. The authorities should initiate a data notice in the event of a child’s death to protect those answers from being lost. The amendment, while small in word count, would be transformational to the rights and experiences of bereaved families. We in this place would be hard pressed to find a parent, or indeed anyone touched by the darkness of a child’s death, who would not support the measures.
It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr Twigg.
I join colleagues in thanking the petitioners, and Ellen Roome in particular, for initiating the petition and enabling this Westminster Hall debate. We were all deeply affected by hearing the statement that was just read out. Ellen, you have the sympathies of everybody here on the loss of Jools aged just 14. We think also of other bereaved families and other campaigners—in the last few days we have been reminded of Ian Russell and the work he has done since the tragic death of Molly—and all those who take the most unimaginably awful situation for a parent and a family and use it to try to make something better for others for the future.
The Government’s response to the petition notes not only that, under the Online Safety Act, platforms have to set out their policy for dealing with such tragic situations, but that the Act
“introduces measures to strengthen coroners’ ability to obtain information”
from platforms via Ofcom, thereby providing a route for parents. We will have to see how that works in practice and how timely it is. What we must not do is put a new, onerous layer on top of parents at the most difficult time imaginable, as they are grieving.
As has been mentioned, there is also the question of historic cases. There will be future historic cases, because not in every case will the inquest have covered this question. I hope the Minister will be able to say a word about whether the data Bill is the opportunity to put it beyond doubt that, ultimately, the parent has an absolute right, with the right safeguards and verifications, to see the information related to their child.
Let me turn from the most tragic of cases to all families and all children. I start with the most important point, which is that trust, support and love within families are the most effective things. Most of the time it is irrelevant what the law is because, within families, we set our own rules. Generally, it is clear that even if our rules are, at times, a pain for our children, they are well-intentioned. We must also note that not quite all families are loving families. Some parents are abusive, and children must always have ways confidentially to seek help from child protection services, the police, the health service and bona fide charities. That applies at any age.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Twigg. I thank all those who signed the petition for raising this issue. My heart goes out to Jools’ family, and I thank them for their work to bring about change so that this does not happen to other people in the future.
I was recently joined by local leaders at an event in Worcester’s fantastic local library to hear the views of young people in the Worcestershire Youth Cabinet. They presented their manifesto for young people, and I was struck by their insights and passion, and in particular by their deep concerns about the impact of the online world on their mental health. I share their concern that online harms have run away from us. We live in a world where people young and old are exposed to harmful content and interfaces. I would like to see us move at pace to regulate not only extreme harms online, but persistent low-level harms that are eroding young people’s mental health.
Having recently met Ofcom, I am concerned that there is much more to do to regulate harmful online media. Although I welcome us taking some first steps in this area, we are far behind where we need to be. If I were to liken our regulation of online harms to the regulation of drugs, we would be in a situation where a local newsagent would be required to assess the risk of supplying class A drugs, while alcohol, cigarettes and over-the-counter medicines remained an unregulated free-for-all. These are historical shortcomings due to previous Governments, but none the less we have much work to do to address the risks of online bullying, harassment and addiction.
In my constituency, I have heard at first hand the stories of men struggling with addiction to pornography and the damaging effects that has had on their relationships and personal wellbeing. We need to be open eyed about the impact of the new online world on adults and young people alike, and it is the duty of Government to empower people to stay safe.
I am very grateful to be able to speak in this debate, which was prompted by Ellen Roome’s petition, although I am extremely sorry that any of us needs to be here at all. I pay tribute to Ellen and all the other families in the Bereaved Families for Online Safety network for their tireless campaigning.
A week before Christmas, I sat in a Committee Room with Ellen and senior representatives from all the major tech firms, including Meta, TikTok, YouTube and Snap. One conversation that morning will stay with me for a very long time—a conversation that I can describe only as harrowing, shocking and deeply depressing. Sitting alongside two other heartbroken parents who have also lost their children because of online harms, Ellen confronted the representatives of TikTok and Instagram, pleading with them to release information that could give her some peace of mind following the death of her beloved son, Jools. There can be nothing worse for a parent than losing a child, but to lose a child and not understand how or why must compound that agony.
Ellen does not know why Jools died. Unlike many other children and young people, he was not being bullied online and did not seem to have any mental health issues. All Ellen wants is to find out what her son was looking at online before he died; it might shed some light on this tragedy that has clearly caused immeasurable grief. It was infuriating to listen to the tech firms’ pathetic excuses that morning about why they could not or would not release the data that Ellen is asking for.
There was—there is—no good reason not to release that data. Jools is no longer with us, so claiming data protection seems frankly pointless. TikTok said that it would be fined for releasing the data, but my question is: by whom? Who is going to press charges against a global tech company for supporting the request of a bereaved mother? Who in their right mind would think that a court case on that point would help anyone?
I was reading up on that issue in preparation for this debate and I came across some amendments to the Data (Use and Access) Bill that would require those huge providers and tech companies to have a complaints procedure, where parents could appeal to their better nature for the release of the data, but if they were refused it, there would be a proper complaints procedure. Does the hon. Lady think that goes far enough?
No, I do not believe that goes far enough. There should be a legal right to access that data without having to go through any complaints process, particularly at a time when one is struggling with the worst bereavement imaginable.
The petition seeks to address that gap in law and ensure that, in the tragic event of a child’s death, parents have the right to access their child’s account to gain closure, to preserve memories and to ensure that harmful content is removed. I support the addition of Jools’ law into the Online Safety Act, and I urge the Government to do whatever they can to apply it retrospectively for those who have campaigned on this issue.
What Ellen’s family have been through is the absolute worst imaginable, but tens of thousands of families up and down the country are struggling with the impact of social media on their children and teenagers. Those children are addicted to their screens because of the wicked algorithms that lure them in; cowed by bullies who can intimidate them in their own bedrooms late at night; struggling with their body image because they do not look like the influencers they watch; depressed because their lives do not resemble the doctored, airbrushed Instagram image of perfection; and brainwashed by influencers who spew toxic messages through their pages.
The damaging impact of social media on our children is vast. Medical professionals from all disciplines tell us regularly of the harms children are experiencing from hour after hour spent glued to a screen. Their physical health is damaged, their mental health even more so, and even their ability to communicate and socialise with other humans is changing.
Does my hon. Friend agree that it is about not only mental health harm, but inattention? I speak to many headteachers in my constituency who tell me that children are unable to concentrate any more because of hours spent on their screen. Would she agree that the Government study announced in November that seeks to explore that issue further should be published soon, because every day and every year we leave it, more children are at risk of harm?
I could not agree more. What is becoming obvious is the impact of children being on their phones late at night, which affects their sleep—even that has a knock-on effect on how well they can operate.
Parents across my South Devon constituency are desperate to protect their children, but they are overwhelmed by the digital world and the power it has over young people. They need legislation to empower and support them. The NSPCC reports that over 60% of young people have encountered online bullying. That is a staggering number, highlighting the need for more robust protections from us for children in the digital space.
It is clear that we need more robust protection, and it is incumbent on us as lawmakers to protect children as we do from other harms such as tobacco and alcohol. It may be right that parents should not have access to their teenager’s social media because of privacy reasons and to protect children’s ability to seek support online, but that makes it even more important and urgent that social media companies should be required and obliged to take responsibility for watertight age verification, and that we should look seriously at raising the age of access to some social media platforms to 16.
I urge the Government to work with social media companies and other stakeholders to create a clear and respectful framework that allows parents access to their child’s social media accounts after a death with no questions asked. This is not about data protection; this is about ensuring that families can concentrate on grieving and healing rather than going into battle against the world’s tech giants.
It is abominable that any bereaved parent should have to do what Ellen and other campaigners are doing. I urge the Minister to legislate so that that does not happen again. I commend the Petitions Committee for bringing this debate to the House and the hon. Member for Sunderland Central for introducing it.
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Such rights are important not just as abstract concepts but because, as I have heard, older children sometimes need private online spaces to help them to explore the world—for example, a teenager understanding their own sexuality before they wish to share it with their parents. We also know that, sadly, in some horrible cases, parents are themselves perpetrators of abuse against their children. Establishing a blanket right to access children’s online activity would remove an important safe route for children to seek support and alert others in such cases.
The petitioners themselves have reflected on such matters, and although they remain determined to support parents to keep their kids safe online, there is a recognition that establishing an overarching parental right to access the data of living teenagers is unlikely to be the appropriate way forward. Instead, it appears to me that parental oversight of a child’s social media use should rather be achieved through strengthening and significantly increasing the uptake of parental controls and other specifically designed arrangements that children and their parents agree to together, as part of the sign-up processes for online services. It is clearly the responsibility of online services to implement and expand such measures, and I hope for rapid progress in that area as a key part of online services’ work to improve children’s safety online in partnership with parents.
I now turn to the issue of bereaved parents’ access to social media data, which is the specific issue for which Ellen has been campaigning, because she is still not able to access data about Jools’ use of online services before his death. I cannot begin to imagine the anguish of losing a child and, even more so, not being given information that might help a parent to understand the circumstances of their child’s death. We rightly talk about laws, protections and rights, but we do not talk enough as a society about the right—indeed, the need—to grieve a loss, especially one as painful as the loss of child.
In preparing for this debate, I spoke with SLOW, or Surviving the Loss of Your World—a charity that offers bereavement support for parents following the loss of a child. The charity emphasised to me the absolute necessity, as part of the grieving process, of establishing an understanding of what led to death. By being denied data about Jools’ online activity before his death, Ellen has been denied the ability to grieve as she wishes. The petition recognises that it cannot be right that a grieving mother is forced to go through years of campaigning and investigation to try to get answers about her son’s death. I urge everyone—especially those working in social media companies—to reflect on the evident injustice of the situation, and to commit to finding a way to do the right thing: to give Ellen the information and answers she needs.
The Online Safety Act 2023 made important provisions for Ofcom and coroners to access social media in relevant cases following a child’s death, in turn helping bereaved families. It is welcome that the current Government’s Data (Use and Access) Bill, which is making its way through Parliament, strengthens those powers and the requirements for data retention so that the risks of data loss in such cases are reduced. However, the provisions do not have retrospective mechanisms, and are therefore not sufficient for historical cases, such as Jools’, where the coronial process has already concluded. As a result, Ellen is in the situation where she has to try and crowdfund a significant sum of money for legal action to get Jools’ inquest re-run, so that the coroner can use the powers now available in law to access Jools’ social media data. It cannot be right that this is necessary.
Some online services say that without a change in the law, they cannot legally release data to bereaved parents like Ellen, but what has struck me in preparation for the debate is that there is not a consensus on the current legal situation. The online safety and data protection expert, John Carr, told me that he did not believe that the general data protection regulations necessarily limited the release of children’s usage data to bereaved parents. Snap, the provider of Snapchat, told me that it already, on a case-by-case basis, discloses usage data to a parent who is the successor to a deceased child.
Other online services—including some of the most prominent social media services used by young people, such as TikTok—seem to take a different interpretation of the law. They state that data protection legislation prohibits them from releasing any data they hold that would give parents like Ellen the answers they deserve. I find this inconsistency of interpretation from online services at best troubling and at worst suspicious, given the historical behaviours of some social media companies that were involved in minimising—and indeed covering up—evidence of the impact of online harm. I believe it is incumbent on all online services to use their considerable resources to push the existing law as far as they can, and to find a way to release data to bereaved families.
I ask all of us present, and anyone watching at home, to consider what we would want to happen if we found ourselves in Ellen’s shoes, and go further to think what rights a parent would assume in those circumstances, as a matter of natural justice. There is, of course, a much wider debate about online harms, but Ellen is using her experiences and her campaign to bring about positive change in this debate. She is seeking answers in order that others do not have to in future.
The case of Jools and Ellen is not the first time that social media companies have come up short. The dynamic and fast-moving nature of the internet means that social media companies are able to act before legislators have a chance to catch up. This is a problem that has persisted for many years, but it is notable that they act only when pushed by brave campaigners like Ellen shining a light on what is happening.
As we have heard, the Online Safety Act takes us a step forward, and it does improve rights of access. The current legislation, however, means that bereaved parents like Ellen are still left to fight bureaucracy. In Ellen’s case, she is seeking retrospective action too. The Government should look at how exactly they can rectify that urgently and in retrospective cases.
There is now an acknowledgment that giving parents the right to automatic access to living children’s social media accounts may have unintended and undesirable consequences relating to child protection, but if the law and parents are to acknowledge that balance, social media companies must do their bit to keep children safe online from predators, inappropriate content and content that may cause children to harm themselves.
Sadly, in recent weeks and months we have seen social media companies make increasingly vociferous claims that the protection of free speech and freedom of expression online must come above all else. The examples of Elon Musk’s bizarre approach to X and Meta’s decision to ditch moderation in favour of community notes are instructive of what is happening and what could happen next, and there has also been much discussion of the impact of the TikTok algorithm on children’s mental health. Other platforms and examples will come up in the future. We have also seen democracies start to act to curtail the power of social media companies—the example of the Australian Government’s approach is instructive, whether or not Members of this House agree with the detail.
I thank the hon. Member for Darlington (Lola McEvoy) for her support for my constituent Ellen; I know it has been valuable to her over the past few weeks and months. I thank Ellen herself and pay tribute to her: she is the person whose petition brings us here today. The heartache and devastation she has endured is unimaginable for the rest of us, but Ellen has turned her grief into something that is positive and could be even more positive for this country and other parents. Having watched her campaign so tirelessly, and provided support where I could for the past few months, I am immensely proud of what she has achieved. We should all be thankful for what Ellen and other members of Bereaved Families for Online Safety are doing. They know what we in this Chamber, the Government, the legal system, police forces and social media companies know: the system is badly failing children and families.
Social media companies must now be placed on notice. They must protect children and respect families or face the consequences. They must protect children so that the Joolses of the present and the future do not meet a tragic and early end. They must respect the Ellens of the past, present and future so they can be confident that their children can be safe too.
Ellen Roome is Jools’ mum. She and I have bonded over our shared belief that there can be a future where our children are safe online, and that there must be a future where every child, in every corner of our great country, is protected from online harm. We are bonded by the fact that we will continue to shout loud until that becomes a reality. Ellen has asked me to read her statement about her work to get to this point—her story. That is a great privilege, and I will read her statement in its entirety without taking interventions, as a mark of respect for her incredible work in this area and for all those she speaks for who have experienced such intolerable pain. The work of the Bereaved Families for Online Safety group has already changed the law, and for that they should be immensely proud.
Before I read Ellen’s statement, I must pay tribute to her. We all hope that if we were put in Ellen’s position or faced with her reality, we would stand up and fight for change. The hard truth is that most people cannot, but Ellen Roome is not most people: she is exceptional. Her grit, tenacity and determination to turn her pain into purpose and progress, and to fight for answers for her family, for all those who knew and loved Jools and for those who have found themselves in the same terrible situation, is truly remarkable. More than that, it is Ellen’s warmth, openness and grace that I have been moved by.
These are her own words:
“It only takes one person to make a stand for morality and justice; in this case, that’s me. However, I'm supported by thousands and thousands of people across the world who think it is morally wrong that I am not entitled to see my child’s social media data, which might provide answers as to why my 14-year-old son chose to end his own life.
When I launched the petition, I asked that ‘Parents should have the right to full access to their child’s social media accounts either whilst they are still alive (to protect them) or if they die, as in my case’. It hadn’t crossed my mind that the parents might be the perpetrators. I now understand this could be the case and hope the Online Safety Bill and Ofcom can protect live children online. However, in my case and that of other parents, when the child has died, who are we protecting? The predators on these platforms? Social Media companies? Surely, I should have the right to look for answers to his cause of death. Jools’ young friends struggle to understand why he is no longer here. The ripple effect of his death is felt not only by us as his parents, but also Jools’ friends, teachers, and everyone in his life was so shocked as to why he ended his life – we deserve possible answers or at least to try for answers.
I am his parent, and he is a minor. As a child, he consented to terms and conditions that permitted social media companies to control his online data. I’m unaware of any other legal context in which a 13-year-old can authorise a legal document, such as terms and conditions.
I have always said that I do not know if it was social media that caused my son to end his own life; however, as a parent, I feel I should morally and humanely have the right to that data to give me possible answers as there was nothing offline which seemed to be an issue to Jools. He was not bullied; he was doing well at school and had many friends. There didn’t appear to be body issues, and whilst he didn’t like his floppy hair or chin, we are unaware of anything else that could be of concern. Yes, he had a cheeky side to him, as do a lot of teenagers, but he was a great kid who loved his parents, and his parents loved him VERY MUCH. I fight now for the right to possible answers as to why my son is no longer alive. I have always thought this to be an online challenge gone wrong.
Many MPs feel that the data bill will solve this issue. It won’t help me or other parents who are in the same awful boat as me. The data bill will allow a coroner the right to access this data in future deaths of children, BUT only if the coroner or the police request it. How do we stop future cases where neither the police nor the coroner asked to see this information? This is what happened in Jools’ case.
As a bereaved parent, I was barely breathing myself after the death of Jools, and I was in no fit state to ask or even think of asking the police and or coroner for this information. This could easily happen again with the new data bill. Also, retrospectively, we cannot obtain this information without applying to the High Court for a second inquest. My lawyer has quoted that it will cost me up to £86,000 to hopefully succeed in the high court, but that seems so wrong to have to find this level of legal fees, which is beyond the reach of almost all bereaved parents, to start looking into missing online activity and what was going on. Also, what a waste of legal professionals and staff involved with a new inquest. I’m just asking for data which I feel should be available to me as his parent. However, I’m not allowed to see it, which is wrong.
I hope this will be a good debate. But please remember that as a member of the Bereaved Families for Online Safety group, I represent many other families in the same awful situation and want to try for answers as to why their precious children are no longer alive.
If this had been your child, you would want answers too. I don’t want any other family to be in this hideous position, which will forever affect us all: our family, Jools’ friends, his teachers, everyone in Jools’ life, and their families, forever.”
Those are Ellen’s words. Ellen’s campaign for justice is rare. As a new MP, I may be forgiven for my perceived naivety, but to me Ellen’s campaign poses a binary choice for us—there is no grey area—so I ask that the Minister does everything in her power to help those seeking answers now, whose cases may not be supported through new measures. It is simply wrong that information that may offer clarity and peace to parents who face a new reality without their child is denied them. It is simply wrong that parents who are living in that unenviable reality now face the colossal emotional and financial burden of a second inquest to discover whether the information exists at all. Ellen Roome is Jools’ mum, a campaigner, a leader and a mother, and Ellen Roome is right.
It is also true that everyone needs a degree of privacy, but there have always been different degrees of privacy, and how private something is should be proportionate to the level of risk involved. In discussing accessing online services, we are talking about things that can have very serious consequences. We want and need to be able to protect our children from harm—from bullying, from unwanted contact, including from adults, and from being drawn to dangerous interests, which can become dangerous obsessions. We also have a responsibility, and we should be held responsible, for them not perpetrating harms on others. Although we trust our children, we know that children do sometimes get into trouble and can come under pressure, and in some cases severe coercion, from others. Of course, they potentially have ready access to material of all sorts that is much more harmful than we had as children. They can go deeper and deeper down rabbit holes.
Parents are not the only ones who can help children, but they have a unique position in children’s lives and are uniquely placed to help and support them. That is why I agree in principle with the petitioner that parents should have a right to see what their child is subjected to or is doing for as long as they are a child and we, as the parents, are responsible for them—and that means at least until age 16. There is a separate debate to be had about the extent of that, and what the threshold and process should be. I understand entirely what the hon. Member for Sunderland Central (Lewis Atkinson) was saying. I do not think anybody is proposing constant, ongoing monitoring, but there are situations that a child could find themselves in that I believe warrant the availability of that access.
There is also a problem, or a hurdle, with the principle: we can only request access to something that we know exists. It is common for children to have multiple social media accounts on a single platform. They probably have different names these days, but people used to call their fake and real accounts finsta and rinsta. The account their mum sees is not necessarily the real one—ironically, the one that was called “fake” was the one where their real lives were actually happening. Of course, they could also be on lots of other platforms that parents and others do not necessarily know about.
I agree with the hon. Member for Sunderland Central, who opened the debate on behalf of the Petitions Committee, that it is of paramount importance that we are able to put some guardrails around what children can access. That is one of the reasons we have parental controls. How those controls work, and the limits of them, are what I want to talk about this afternoon.
I will read out a short note from Microsoft, which is not a company that people normally worry about—it is a very responsible operator—to a constituent ahead of their child’s 13th birthday. It says:
“Congratulations on Fred’s birthday. At this age, certain laws allow them to have more control and choices over their own account settings. This means that they’ll be able to change a number of family safety settings, even if you already have them set up. Fred will also need to allow you to continue receiving data about their activities to guide their digital journey. They can turn off your ability to see their activity on Windows, Xbox, and Android devices. They can turn off your ability to see their devices and check on updates…safety settings like firewall and antivirus…They can stop sharing their location through their mobile phone.”
That was for a child approaching their 13th birthday, which leads me to question what “certain laws” are being cited. I can only assume it is the Data Protection Act 2018, which sets out that
“a child aged 13 years or older”
can
“consent to his or her personal data being processed by providers of information society services.”
The genesis of that was European law, and Parliament was debating and voting on it in parallel with, but before actually completing, exit from the European Union. The age 13 is not universal. EU law specified a range between 13 and 16, and multiple countries did select 13, but not all. France set the age at 15, with some limited non-contractual consents for data processing allowed between 13 and 15. Germany and the Netherlands set the age at 16. There is that question of what is the appropriate age, but the other big question is what that age actually means.
The 2018 Act was passed before we considered the Online Safety Bill, which became the Online Safety Act 2023, but we were already concerned in this House about online safety, and I am fairly sure that it was not Parliament’s intent to reduce parental oversight. In particular, I do not think saying that a service can have a child sign up to it at 13 is the same as saying that the parent cannot stop them. Still less, it is not the same as saying that the parent should not be able to know what their child is signed up to.
In setting out why the age was set at 13, the explanatory notes to the 2018 Act say, quite rightly, that that is in line with the minimum age that popular services such as Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram set, but they go on to say, slightly unrelatedly:
“This means children aged 13 and above would not need to seek consent from a guardian when accessing, for example…services which provide educational websites and research resources to complete their homework.”
I think that sentence might have a lot to answer for. It sounds very sensible—we would not want children having to get over hurdles to finish their homework—but if we think about it, it is not necessary to sign up to research something on the internet for homework anyway, and educational websites are generally exempt from consent requirements. But the big question is, what else might it allow—or, crucially, what else might it be interpreted to allow?
I repeat that I do not believe that it was Parliament’s intent in effect to disable parental safety controls for 13, 14 and 15-year-olds. There is a whole other question about those safety controls themselves and how they work, and how difficult it can be for parents—and even all of us, who tend to think we are quite good at this sort of thing—to keep on top of them, particularly if they have multiple children, different operating systems and multiple platforms. There really should be a single industry standard entry system that can cover all of screen time and basic, entry-level approvals with a default “safety on” version of the different platforms.
We talk about age thresholds and age limits; there is a whole other set of questions about how those apply and how we make age assurance or age verification work properly. Those are both debates for another day. Today, I simply ask the Minister: is it the Government’s understanding of the existing legislation that children under 16 should be able to switch off parental controls? If not, what could be done to clarify the situation? Is a change needed in primary legislation?
Young people in Worcester told me that although they want online sources to be regulated, and to be equipped themselves for that world, what they want most is for their parents to be empowered to advise, guide and journey with them through the digital world. I agree that most parents are currently very poorly supported, and I welcome the enthusiasm I sense from Labour leaders for family hubs, which offer a community-led and empowering vehicle for that work. Does the Minister agree that we should equip parents and carers to navigate these hazards with their children, so that instead of feeling isolated, anxious and alone, young people feel supported, understood and empowered?
As we have heard from the hon. Member for Sunderland Central (Lewis Atkinson), some social companies have behaved differently in such cases. It is quite clear, however, why some will not agree to release that data: it is a pathetic attempt to avoid the potential bad publicity that will follow if it becomes clear that Jools’ short life ended after taking part in a social media challenge, which is one possibility. It is about protecting the reputation of those social media companies. It is about the accountants who fear the lawsuits. In short, I suggest it is about money. The absence of humanity, care and compassion in that room before Christmas was palpable and I applaud Ellen for having the courage to come back here today.
I can see no reason why tech companies cannot immediately release the data that these devastated parents are asking for. I fully support Ellen and all the other parents in their attempts to get Jools’ law on the statute books. In the meantime, I plead with Instagram and TikTok to not wait for a legal challenge, but just release the data: find your inner human and do something decent; imagine if it were your child.
Under UK law we have clear, legal processes for handling physical estates after death. It is high time that we establish clear protocols for the digital estates that are left behind, particularly the digital estates left by young people. The law must catch up with the world we are living in. Current provisions, such as Facebook’s legacy contact feature, are not sufficient, because they rely on a child making a decision while they are still alive, often without fully understanding the implications, as has been mentioned. It is also quite possible that, if children were asked whether their parents could have full access to all of their digital online life in the event of their death, they would say no. Without formal, legal access arrangements, parents are left with no way of viewing their children’s account.