Online Pornography: Digital Economy Act 2017

Baroness Merron Excerpts

Wednesday 26th October 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

I thank the noble Viscount for that question. It is very important that we understand the tension that we will see in this debate. Of course we want to protect children and adults from illegal content, unpleasant content and anything that encourages suicide, violence and other such things. At the same time, we live in a free society and we have to get the balance with freedom of speech right. This will be a challenge and I think we will have very interesting debates in this House. Indeed, we have a debate on this issue tomorrow. It will show the range of views but, with noble Lords’ wisdom, we will try to reach that right balance.

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

My Lords, Ofcom’s new polling shows that 78% of people expect to verify their age when carrying out certain activities online, including gambling or buying alcohol, and 80% believe that users should be required to verify their age when accessing pornography online. Given this level of public support and how easily young people are able to access pornography, why has there been long-running resistance from the Government to act?