Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what plans she has bring forward legislative proposals under the Digital Charter, published on 25 January 2018, to exempt repeat viewing of terrorist propaganda for civil society organisations, including journalists and researchers, working on terrorism-related issues.

The Government intends to change the law, so that people who repeatedly view terrorist content online could face up to 15 years behind bars. The proposed changes will strengthen the existing offence of possessing information likely to be useful to a terrorist (Section 58 Terrorism Act 2000) so that it applies to material that is viewed repeatedly or streamed online.

A defence of ‘reasonable excuse’ will still be available to academics, journalists or others who may have a legitimate reason to view such material.