Oral Answers to Questions

Damian Collins Excerpts

Wednesday 18th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I understand that the case is now under urgent review and a decision will be made shortly.

[Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)]

It is fantastic that we will very soon have the covid vaccine, but extremely concerning that in a recent survey, one in five people say they will not take it. Does the Prime Minister agree that social media companies should be doing more to remove anti-vaccine disinformation and conspiracy theories? Will he consider including requirements to do that within the scope of the Government’s forthcoming online harms Bill?

[The Prime Minister]

Yes. I am very pleased that Facebook, Twitter and Google have committed that no company should profit from or promote vaccine disinformation and that companies should respond to that kind of content very quickly. We are going to publish our response shortly to the online harms White Paper consultation and will be setting out our plans for legislation.