Crime and Policing Bill

Lord Clement-Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 27th January 2026 Lords Chamber

To be clear, these amendments would achieve a third, very important thing. They would give clarity and confidence to parents that they will get answers to their questions about the death of their child that relate to their social media usage. It is a disgrace that we still have a gap in legislation that potentially puts parents through more pain as they open a page where the first line says, “In rare cases”. The Government can simplify this system immediately by accepting these amendments. I hope the Minister will say yes when she comes to respond.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, these Benches support Amendments 474, 475, 438ED and 438EE, which all stand in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, and to which I am pleased and privileged to have added my name alongside the noble Baronesses, Lady Morgan of Cotes and Lady Barran. I pay tribute to the relentless campaigning on behalf of bereaved families by the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, and to her utterly moving and convincing introduction today. I also pay tribute to all those bereaved families who have fought for these provisions.

I associate myself with everything the noble Baroness said about the implementation of and the intent behind the Online Safety Act, which has not achieved what we all set out for it to do. Together, these amendments address a singular, tragic failure in our current justice system: the loss of vital digital evidence following the death of a child. There has been powerful testimony regarding what is called the suspension gap. That occurs when a coroner investigating the death of a child feels unable to issue a data preservation notice because a police investigation is technically active, yet the police might not have prioritised the securing of digital evidence. During this period of hesitation, data held by social media companies is deleted and the opportunity to understand the child’s final interactions is lost for ever.

Currently, many coroners remain unaware that they can request data preservation notices in the early stages of an investigation. We have heard heartbreaking reports from bereaved parents that coroners feel unable to act while police investigations are active. Because inquests are routinely suspended during these investigations, the data is often deleted due to account inactivity or routine system operations before the coroner can issue an information notice.

The Molly Rose Foundation and the 5Rights Foundation have been clear. Automatic preservation is essential, because data is the key to joining the dots in these tragic cases. We cannot allow another child’s digital history and the truth about their death to vanish because of bureaucratic delay. As Ofcom has recently clarified, service providers are not required to retain data they do not already hold. They simply need to notify the regulator if information is missing. During recent consultations, major providers such as Meta and Microsoft did not object to preserving data from further back, provided it was still within their systems.

Too often, police seize a physical device but fail to notify Ofcom of potential breaches of the Online Safety Act. These amendments work in tandem. Amendments 474 and 475 would freeze the evidence automatically and provide the legal mechanism to preserve data. Amendments 438ED and 438EE would ensure that the police and coroners are fully aware of their responsibilities and protocols to collect that evidence. Together, they would ensure that potential online harm is treated with the same priority as a physical weapon in every investigation into a child’s death.

These amendments are about ensuring that our coroners system is fit for a digital age. They provide the speed and technical certainty required to support bereaved families in their pursuit of justice. We cannot continue to allow a lack of process to obscure the truth about why a child has died. We cannot allow the deletion of evidence to become the enemy of justice. I urge the Minister, as have the noble Baronesses, to accept these amendments as a necessary modernisation of our investigatory framework.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My Lords, if I needed persuading—and I am not sure I did—the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, and her supporters have certainly persuaded me that there is a serious problem here. As legislators who spend hours in this Chamber, we all know that law without enforcement is a dead letter in a sealed book, and not what anyone wants to be spending their lives on. If, as it seems, there are gaps of responsibility and agency between coroners, the police, Ofcom and, dare I say it, the great big untouchable tech imperium that monetises our data and effectively monetises our lives, those gaps need to be dealt with.

Just as I pay tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, not just for her commitment but for her expertise on online harms, I will say that my noble friend the Minister is probably one of the most expert and experienced criminal lawyers in your Lordships’ House. If these precise amendments are too broad and too onerous for catching children who, for example, were too young to have a device, I am sure that my noble friend the Minister will be able to address that. Between these noble Baronesses and other noble Lords of good faith, something can be done.