Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of increasing the penalties for people found guilty of deliberately creating and spreading misinformation on covid-19 vaccines.

The Government takes the issue of misinformation and disinformation very seriously.

The Online Safety Bill will force companies to take action to prevent the proliferation of illegal content online that is in scope of the Bill, including illegal misinformation and disinformation. This would include misinformation containing direct incitement to violence such as encouraging violence against public health officials on the false premise that COVID-19 is a hoax.

The Law Commission’s recommended false communications offence is also being brought into law through the Bill. This will capture any communications where the individual knows the information to be false but sends this communication intending to cause harm. This would include dangerous disinformation about the vaccine, or hoax COVID-19 treatments. The offence will be summary only and will carry a maximum penalty of imprisonment for a term not exceeding 51 weeks or a fine, or both.

The Online Safety Bill will also require the biggest companies to address content that is legal but causes significant physical or psychological harm to adults - including some types of misinformation and disinformation, such as anti-vaccination content.

Alongside this legislation, the government has also developed a Media Literacy Strategy and SHARE checklist which aims to increase audience resilience by educating and empowering those who see, inadvertently share and are affected by false and misleading information.