Protecting Young People Online

5. What steps she is taking to help reduce social media harms for children under 16.

6. What steps her Department is taking to help protect young people online.

12. What steps her Department is taking to help protect young people online.

With the groundbreaking steps in the Online Safety Act 2023, we are protecting children from illegal and harmful content online. The Secretary of State’s first step was to ensure that self-harm and suicide content were made priority offences. We have legislated to criminalise both the depiction of strangulation in pornography and the creation of non-consensual intimate images, making them priority offences. We have now launched a short, sharp consultation to protect children’s experiences online. Under this Government, children’s wellbeing is put right at the heart of our decisions.

The Online Safety Act was intended to protect children and teenagers from harmful social media content. The Molly Rose Foundation’s study found that, before the Act’s implementation, over a third of 13 to 17-year-olds had seen harmful content online, including self-harm, depression or eating disorder content. Young people in my constituency tell me that they still see this content, so will the Minister commit to publish a report examining whether the Online Safety Act is meeting its stated aim of keeping children safe online, while we wait for the Government’s response to their own consultation?

I thank the hon. Lady for raising that important point. I have engaged deeply and frequently with the Molly Rose Foundation on this issue and wider concerns. We continue to ensure that the monitoring and evaluation of the Online Safety Act’s implementation is in progress—I am engaging regularly on that, and I am happy to continue the conversation.

I have heard from many parents in Derby who want to know that their children are properly protected when they go online, not left exposed to harmful content or addictive design features. I have also spoken to many young people who are also concerned about what they face online. Can the Minister set out how, in addition to listening to the voices of organisations representing children and bereaved families, which is vital, we put children and young people at the heart of this national conversation and ensure that their voices are heard too?

I first pay tribute to my hon. Friend for the depth and breadth of her advocacy for the people of Derby. I can confirm that I would be delighted to ensure that we continue the conversation with young people. I was at a school last week, and I will be in a school this week. I commit to the House that the Secretary of State and I will continue to put young people at the heart of all our decisions.

I have been contacted by over 400 of my constituents who are calling for greater regulation of social media and young people’s use of it. There is disagreement about whether there should be a full or partial ban, and the exact age at which it should be introduced. Regardless of where the Government’s consultation leads, there will be a cliff edge, and young people will, at some point, start to engage with the digital world. With that in mind, what engagement is the Department having with the Department for Education’s curriculum review to give young people the skills, information and support they need to identify online harms and misinformation?

My hon. Friend is absolutely right: regulation is one part of this issue, but we are also focused on the fundamental aspects of media literacy and education. We are engaging very closely with the Department for Education on a media literacy aspect of the national curriculum to ensure that our young people can spot misinformation and disinformation, and that they are prepared to make the most of online experiences.

Further to the question put to the Secretary of State by the Chairman of the Select Committee, the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West (Dame Chi Onwurah), my teenage informant tells me that if you ask them the right question, most US-based search engines will tell you how to access the dark web. That is clearly undesirable, so what are we doing to stop it?

We are looking very closely at that. Of course, under the Online Safety Act, platforms already have a responsibility to make sure that young people are not able to access harmful content. In relation to wider access methods—whether virtual private networks or others—we are looking very closely at patterns of behaviour. So far, we have been pretty successful; after an initial spike in the use of some of those platforms, we have seen a levelling-off, which I very much hope continues. We will continue to monitor the situation.