Online Safety Bill
Debate between Damian Collins and Maria MillerTuesday 12th July 2022
(1 year, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Online Safety Act 2023 View all Online Safety Act 2023 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: Consideration of Bill Amendments as at 12 July 2022 - (12 Jul 2022)
Dame Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)
My hon. Friend did not have the joy of being on the Bill Committee, as I did with my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon South (Chris Philp), who was the Minister at that point. The point that my hon. Friend has just made about free speech is so important for women and girls who are not able to go online because of the violent abuse that they receive, and that has to be taken into account by those who seek to criticise the Bill. We have to make sure that people who currently feel silenced do not feel silenced in future and can participate online in the way that they should be able to do. My hon. Friend is making an excellent point and I welcome him to his position.
Damian Collins
My right hon. Friend is entirely right on that point. The structure of the Bill is very simple. There is a legal priority of harms, and things that are illegal offline will be regulated online at the level of the criminal threshold. There are protections for freedom of speech and there is proper transparency about harmful content, which I will come on to address.