Online Safety Bill

Debate between Damian Collins and William Cash

Consideration of Lords amendments
Tuesday 12th September 2023 Commons Chamber

[Damian Collins]

The length of the process we have gone through on this Bill is a good thing, because we have ended up with probably the most comprehensive legislation in the world. We have a regulator with more power, and more power to sanction, than anywhere else. It is important to get that right.

A lot of the regulation is principle-based. It is about the regulation of user-to-user services, whereby people share things with each other through an intermediary service. Technology will develop, but those principles will underpin a lot of it. There will be specific cases where we need to think about whether the regulatory oversight works in a metaverse environment in which we are dealing with harms created by speech that has no footprint. How do we monitor and scrutinise that?

One of the hardest challenges could be making sure that companies continue to use appropriate technology to identify and mitigate harms on their platforms. The problem we have had with the regime to date is that we have relied on self-reporting from the technology companies on what is or is not possible. Indeed, the debate about end-to-end encryption is another example. The companies are saying that, if they share too much data, there is a danger that it will break encryption, but they will not say what data they gather or how they use it. For example, they will not say how they identify illegal use of their platform. Can they see the messages that people have sent after they have sent them? They will not publicly acknowledge it, and they will not say what data they gather and what triggers they could use to intervene, but the regulator will now have the right to see them. That principle of accountability and the power of the regulator to scrutinise are the two things that make me confident that this will work, but we may need to make amendments because of new things that we have not yet thought about.

[Sir William Cash]

In addition to the idea of annual scrutiny raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis), does my hon. Friend think it would be a reasonably good idea for the Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport to set up a Sub-Committee under its Standing Orders to keep any eye on this stuff? My hon. Friend was a great Chairman of that Select Committee, and such a Sub-Committee would allow the annual monitoring of all the things that could go wrong, and it could also try to keep up with the pace of change.

[Damian Collins]

When I chaired the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee, we set up a Sub-Committee to consider these issues and internet regulation. Of course, the Sub-Committee has the same members. It is up to the Select Committee to determine how it structures itself and spends its time, but there is only so much that any one departmental Select Committee can do among its huge range of other responsibilities. It might be worth thinking about a special Committee, drawing on the powers and knowledge of both Houses, but that is not a matter for the Bill. As my hon. Friend knows, it is a matter of amending the Standing Orders of the House, and the House must decide that it wants to create such a Committee. I think it is something we should consider.

We must make sure that encrypted services have proper transparency and accountability, and we must bring in skilled experts. Members have talked about researcher access to the companies’ data and information, and it cannot be a free-for-all; there has to be a process by which a researcher applies to get privileged access to a company’s information. Indeed, as part of responding to Ofcom’s risk registers, a company could say that allowing researchers access is one of the ways it seeks to ensure safe use of its platform, by seeking the help of others to identify harm.

There is nothing to stop Ofcom appointing many researchers. The Bill gives Ofcom the power to delegate its authority and its powers to outside expert researchers to investigate matters on its behalf. In my view, that would be a good thing for Ofcom to do, because it will not have all the expertise in-house. The power to appoint a skilled person to use the powers of Ofcom exists within the Bill, and Ofcom should say that it intends to use that power widely. I would be grateful if the Minister could confirm that Ofcom has that power in the Bill.

Public Confidence in the Media and Police

Debate between Damian Collins and William Cash

Wednesday 20th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Damian Collins]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right, and that is an important point. Going back to what I said about the importance of good structures of corporate governance there are victims within organisations that fail the test of corporate governance—innocent people who have done their jobs well lose out as a result of the mistakes of others. That is why it is so important that those structures should be there. Whatever lessons have been drawn from the scandal so far, that surely must be one lesson that the Murdochs have to learn from it; that is of the greatest importance.

Models of self-regulation can work, but clearly there is a need for total reform of the regulation of the press. The principle of a free press is, of course, of the highest importance. That must continue, but that does not mean that journalists can operate outside the law.

[Mr Cash]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the self-regulation of the press in the 21st century has to be regarded as self-regulation, or regulation, of the media as a whole?

[Damian Collins]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who makes an important point. The media and the news, in particular, work across multiple platforms; people get their news not just from newspapers, but from television and the internet, so there is a case for that, although that is quite a big and broad challenge. Certainly, among the regulators there should be people who have experience of multiple media platforms, and an understanding of what is acceptable. That is something to consider.

In the short time left to me, I want to raise a second point. We all agree that there is a good, strong, and important case for free media and a free press, but there is also a strong role for the regulators with regard to mergers involving media organisations. There was discussion earlier about whether politicians should be taken out of the process. It would be wrong for politicians to exercise independent judgment outside of legitimate advice about what companies are fit and proper, and what companies should, or should not, be merged. That should be based on a good high degree of technical and professional knowledge.

The right hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes) spoke, in answer to an intervention, about the application of a “fit and proper person” test. We on the Select Committee had a briefing about that from Ofcom, in whose eyes it is a real test. It has applied it in the past, and has removed broadcast licences from digital broadcasters in the past. I am sure that if Ofcom is monitoring this debate, it would be happy to send information about that to any hon. Members who have an interest in the issue.

We have an obligation to ensure that there is a free and open marketplace for media. The Leader of the Opposition raised his concern about the dominance of Sky in the pay TV market, but we have to look at that market as a whole, and not just one area of it. Yes, Sky is dominant in pay TV; ITV is also dominant when it comes to traditional advertising revenue generated from television. Most people probably get their news and content from the BBC. In the digital media age, all those will be accessible from one platform. When YouView launches next year, there will be more choice more easily available to consumers than ever before.

Although media companies are very different, it is right that we consider them as part of the same entity. We also have to consider that in the internet age, people will increasingly get their news from powerful online organisations such as Google, and social networking sites such as Facebook, which are out of the scope of the regulation of the UK media. We have to consider how media organisations in this country can compete with added pressure from those platforms, so we have to look at the totality of the media market.

We should recognise that newspapers are an enormously important part of our national life; many millions of people still enjoy buying and reading physical newspapers every week, as well as accessing them online, but newspapers, as a business model, struggle. They often succeed better when they are part of integrated media companies with the financial muscle to support them. To refer to remarks made earlier, that is why it is important that there should be oversight of the whole market, and that we consider the competitiveness and regulation of the whole market, and see it as a single entity producing news and taking it to people. When it is well run, healthy and respectable, it is of the greatest importance to a free society and a great democracy.