Age-verification regulator’s power to direct internet service providers to block access to material

Digital Economy Bill – in the House of Commons at 4:44 pm on 28 November 2016.

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“(1) Where the age-verification regulator considers that a person (“the non-complying person”) is—

(a) contravening section15(1), or

(b) making prohibited material available on the internet to persons in the United Kingdom,

it may give a notice under this subsection to any internet service provider.

(2) The notice must—

(a) identify the non-complying person in such manner as the age-verification regulator considers appropriate;

(b) state which of paragraphs (a) and (b) of subsection (1) applies;

(c) require the internet service provider—

(i) to take steps specified in the notice, or

(ii) (if no such steps are specified) to put in place arrangements that appear to the provider to be appropriate,

so as to prevent persons in the United Kingdom from being able to access the offending material using the service it provides;

(d) provide such information as the regulator considers may assist the internet service provider in complying with any requirement imposed by the notice;

(e) provide information about the arrangements for appeals mentioned in section17(4)(d);

(f) provide such further particulars as the regulator considers appropriate.

(3) The steps that may be specified or arrangements that may be put in place under subsection (2)(c) include steps or arrangements that will or may also have the effect of preventing persons in the United Kingdom from being able to access material other than the offending material using the service provided by the internet service provider.

(4) The notice may require the internet service provider to provide information specified in the notice, in a manner specified in the notice, to persons in the United Kingdom who—

(a) attempt to access the offending material using the service provided by the provider, and

(b) are prevented from doing so as a result of steps taken, or arrangements put in place, by the provider pursuant to the notice.

(5) The notice may specify the time by which the internet service provider must have complied with any requirement imposed by the notice.

(6) The notice may be varied or revoked by a further notice under subsection (1).

(7) The age-verification regulator may publish, in whatever way it considers appropriate, a notice given under subsection (1).

(8) It is the duty of an internet service provider to comply with any requirement imposed on it by a notice under subsection (1).

(9) That duty is enforceable in civil proceedings by the age-verification regulator—

(a) for an injunction;

(b) for specific performance of a statutory duty under section 45 of the Court of Session Act 1988; or

(c) for any other appropriate relief or remedy.

(10) Before giving a notice to an internet service provider under subsection (1), the age-verification regulator must—

(a) inform the Secretary of State of its decision to do so, and

(b) give notice of that decision to the non-complying person under this subsection.

(11) A notice under subsection (10) (other than notice of a decision to revoke a notice under subsection (1)) must—

(a) where subsection (1)(a) applies—

(i) say why the regulator considers that the non-complying person is contravening section15(1), and

(ii) indicate what steps the regulator considers might be taken by the non-complying person to comply with that section;

(b) where subsection (1)(b) applies, say why the regulator considers that the offending material is prohibited material;

(c) indicate the circumstances in which the regulator may consider revoking the notice it has decided to give under subsection (1) and the manner in which the non-complying person may notify the regulator of steps taken to satisfy the regulator that the notice ought to be revoked;

(d) provide information about the arrangements for appeals mentioned in section17(4)(e).

(12) In this section—

“the offending material”, in relation to a non-complying person, means the material which the age-verification regulator considers is—

(a) being made available in contravention of section 15(1) by the non-complying person; or

(b) prohibited material which the non-complying person is making available on the internet to persons in the United Kingdom;

“prohibited material” has the meaning given in section 22(4).”—(Matt Hancock.)

This new clause enables the age-verification regulator to require internet service providers to prevent persons in the United Kingdom from being able to access material on the internet where it is being made available in contravention of clause 15(1) or is “prohibited material” as defined in clause 22.

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Photo of John Bercow John Bercow Chair, Speaker's Committee on the Electoral Commission, Speaker of the House of Commons, Chair, Speaker's Committee for the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority, Speaker of the House of Commons, Chair, Commons Reference Group on Representation and Inclusion Committee, Chair, Speaker's Committee for the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority, Chair, Speaker's Committee for the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority, Chair, Speaker's Committee for the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority, Chair, Speaker's Committee on the Electoral Commission, Chair, Commons Reference Group on Representation and Inclusion Committee

With this it will be convenient to discuss Government new clause 29—On-demand programme services: specially restricted material.

New clause 1—Power to require the blocking of access to pornographic material by internet service providers—

“(1) Where the age-verification regulator determines that a person has made pornographic material available on a commercial basis on the internet to persons in the United Kingdom—

(a) in contravention of section 15(1), and

(b) the person has been the subject of a financial penalty or enforcement notice under section 20 and the contravention has not ceased, the age-verification regulator may issue a notice to internet service providers requiring them to prevent access to the pornographic material that is provided by the non-complying person.

(2) A notice under subsection (1) must—

(a) identify the non-complying person in such manner as the age verification regulator considers appropriate;

(b) provide such further particulars as the age-verification regulator considers appropriate.

(3) When the age-verification regulator gives notice under this section, it must inform the non-complying person, by notice, that it has done so.

(4) An internet service provider who fails to comply with a requirement imposed by subsection (1) commits an offence, subject to subsection (5).

(5) No offence is committed under subsection (4) if the internet service provider took all reasonable steps and exercised all due diligence to ensure that the requirement would be complied with.

(6) An internet service provider guilty of an offence under subsection (4) is liable, on summary conviction, to a fine.

(7) In this section “internet service provider” has the same meaning as in section 124N of the Communications Act 2003 (interpretation).”

This new clause gives a power to the age-verification regulator to require internet service providers to block pornography websites that do not offer age-verification.

New clause 3—Safety responsibilities of social media sites—

“(1) This section applies to a person who operates an internet site for commercial purposes which requires a user to create a personal account to fully access the internet site.

(2) A person under subsection (1) must—

(a) undertake and publish an online safety impact assessment in respect of their account holders,

(b) inform the police if they become aware of any threat on its internet site to physically harm an individual,

(c) remove any posts made on its internet site that are deemed to be violent or that could incite violence.”

New clause 10—Internet pornography: requirement to teach age requirement and risks as part of sex education—

“After section 403(1A)(b) of the Education Act 1996, add—

“(c) they learn about the risks and dangers of internet pornography, and the legal age requirement to access internet pornography under Part 3 of the Digital Economy Act 2017.””

This new clause would mean that the Secretary of State would have to include in guidance to maintained schools that pupils learn as part of sex education the risks and dangers of internet pornography and the legal age requirement to access it, as provided for under Part 3.

New clause 13—Code of practice for commercial social media platform providers on online abuse—

“(1) The relevant Minister must issue a code of practice about the responsibilities of commercial social media platform providers in dealing with online abuse.

(2) The code of practice must include guidance on—

(a) how a commercial social media platform providers shall respond to cases of a person being victim of online abuse on its internet site;

(b) quality service standards expected of the commercial social media platform providers in determining, assessing, and responding to cases of online abuse; and

(c) the setting and enforcement of privacy settings of persons aged 17 or under, where deemed appropriate.

(3) A commercial social media platform providers must comply with the code of practice.

(4) The relevant Minister may from time to time revise and re-issue the code of practice.

(5) As soon as is reasonably practicable after issuing or reissuing the code of practice the relevant Minister must lay, or arrange for the laying of, a copy of it before—

(a) Parliament,

(b) the Scottish Parliament,

(c) the National Assembly for Wales, and

(d) the Northern Ireland Assembly.

(6) In this section “commercial social media platform providers” means a person who operates an internet site on a commercial basis on which people can interact.”

New clause 32—Approval of Age-verification providers—

“(1) Age-verification providers must be approved by the age-verification regulator.

(2) In this section an “age-verification provider” means a person who appears to the age-verification regulator to provide, in the course of a business, a service used by a person to ensure that pornographic material is not normally accessible by persons under the age of 18.

(3) The age-verification regulator must publish a code of practice to be approved by the Secretary of State and laid before Parliament.

(4) The code will include provisions to ensure that age-verification providers—

(a) perform a Data Protection Impact Assessment and make this publicly available,

(b) take full and appropriate measures to ensure the accuracy, security and confidentiality of the data of their users,

(c) minimise the processing of personal information to that which is necessary for the purposes of age-verification,

(d) do not disclose the identity of individuals verifying their age to persons making pornography available on the internet,

(e) take full and appropriate measures to ensure that their services do not enable persons making pornography available on the internet to identify users of their sites or services across differing sites or services,

(f) do not create security risks for third parties or adversely impact security systems or cyber security,

(g) comply with a set standard of accuracy in verifying the age of users.

(5) Age-verification Providers must comply with the code of practice.

(6) To the extent that a term of a contract purports to prevent or restrict the doing of any act required to comply with the Code, that term is unenforceable.”

Amendment 27, in clause 15, page 18, line 7, after “material” insert “or adult material”.

This amendment and amendments 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33 and 34 would require all providers of internet content which is not suitable for children to put in place a robust age-verification system. In the offline world, children are not allowed to view material which the BBFC has classified to be only suitable for adults. This amendment ensures that these restrictions apply equally to the online world.

Amendment 28, page 18, line 11, after “material” insert “or adult material”.

See explanatory statement for amendment 27.

Amendment 29, page 18, line 18, after “material” insert “or adult material”.

See explanatory statement for amendment 27.

Amendment 30, page 18, line 24, after “material” insert “or adult material”.

See explanatory statement for amendment 27.

Amendment 2, page 18, line 36, at end insert—

“(7) The Secretary of State must make regulations to ensure that the definition of specially restricted material in section 368E(5) of the Communications Act 2003 is amended to reflect the definitions in this Part.”

The amendment requires the making of regulations to ensure that there is a parity of protection for children using different online media. The regulations would amend the definition of specially restricted material for UK based video on demand programming and extend it to 18 material as well as R18 material.

Amendment 31, in clause 16, page 19, line 17, at end insert—

“16 (1A) In this Part “adult material” means any of the following—

(a) a video work in respect of which the video works authority has issued an 18 certificate;

(b) any other material if it is reasonable to assume from its nature that any classification certificate issued for a video work including it would be an 18 certificate; and

(c) any other material if it is reasonable to assume that the video works authority would determine that a video work including it was not suitable for a classification certificate to be issued in respect of it.”

See explanatory statement for amendment 27.

Government amendments 35 and 36.

Amendment 32, in clause 19, page 21, line 9, after “material” insert “or adult material”.

See explanatory statement for amendment 27.

Amendment 1, in clause 20, page 22, line 26, at end insert—

“(13) Where a person is—

(a) based in a country outside the United Kingdom, and

(b) refusing to comply with the requirements of the age-verification regulator, the age-verification regulator shall notify Ofcom that the relevant person is refusing to comply with its requirements.

(14) Following a notification made under subsection (13), Ofcom shall direct internet service providers in the United Kingdom to block public access to the material made available by the person on the internet.

(15) An internet service provider that fails to comply with subsection (14) within a reasonable period would be subject to financial penalties imposed by the age-verification regulator under section 21.”

Amendment 33, in clause 22, page 24, line 33, after first “material” insert “, adult material,”.

See explanatory statement for amendment 27.

Government amendment 37.

Amendment 34, in clause 23, page 25, line 5, after first “material” insert “, adult material,”.

See explanatory statement for amendment 27.

Government amendments 38 to 42.

New clause 7—Bill limits for all mobile phone contracts—

“(1) A telecommunications service provider supplying a contract relating to a hand-held mobile telephone must, at the time of entering into such a contract, allow the end-user the opportunity to place a financial cap on the monthly bill under that contract.

(2) A telecommunications service provider under subsection (1) must not begin to supply a contracted service to an end-user unless the end-user has either—

(a) requested the monthly cap be put in place and agreed the amount of that cap, or

(b) decided, on a durable medium, not to put a monthly cap in place.

(3) The end-user should bear no cost for the supply of any service above the cap if the provider has—

(a) failed to impose a cap agreed under subsection (2)(a);

(b) introduce, or amend, a cap following the end-user’s instructions under subsection (2)(b); or

(c) removed the cap without the end-user’s instructions or has removed it without obtaining the consumer’s express consent on a durable medium under subsection (2).”

New clause 14—Impact assessment of macro not-spot roaming—

“(1) Within three months of this Act coming into force, the Secretary of State must commission an impact assessment of enabling a system of macro not-spot roaming in the UK, and shall lay the report of the impact assessment before each House of Parliament.

(2) In this section “macro not-spot roaming” means the ability for hand-held mobile telephone users based in relatively large areas of non or partial broadband coverage to access coverage from networks other than their own.”

This new clause calls for an impact assessment of macro not-spot roaming in the UK, in line with the recommendations of the British Infrastructure Group report on mobile coverage.

New clause 20—Ability of end-user to cancel telephone contract in event of lack of signal at residence—

“A telecommunications service provider must allow an end-user to cancel a contract relating to a hand-held mobile telephone if, at any point during the contract term, the mobile telephones is consistently unable to obtain a signal when located at the end-user’s main residence.”

New clause 21—Use of emergency serve network wireless telegraphy infrastructure by multiple network providers—

“After section 8(4) of the Wireless Telegraphy Act 2006, insert—

“(4A) A licence issued in respect of a wireless telegraphy station or apparatus that is used for the purposes of emergency service network shall stipulate that more than one network provider can use the station or apparatus.””

New clause 22—OFCOM power to enforce structural separation of BT Openreach

“After section 49C of the Communications Act 2003 insert—

“(49D) OFCOM has the power to enforce the structural separation of BT Openreach, should OFCOM consider this necessary.””

New clause 25—Ability of end-user to cancel mobile telephone contract in event of lack of signal at residence and place of employment—

“A telecommunications service provider must allow an end-user to cancel a contract relating to a hand-held mobile device if, at any point during the contract term, the mobile device is consistently unable to obtain a signal when located at the end user’s main residence or main place of employment.”

New clause 26—Wireless telegraphy licences and medical or hearing technology—

“After section 14(4) of the Wireless Telegraphy Act 2006, insert—

“(4A) Before granting a wireless telegraphy licence, Ofcom shall carry out tests to identify the risk of any interference with any medical or hearing technology and publish its findings.

(4B) Ofcom shall not grant a licence if tests carried out under section 14(4A) have found there is a risk of interference with medical or hearing technology unless—

(a) action is taken to eliminate the risk; or

(b) a fund is set up to meet the costs of replacing all medical or hearing technology affected by the interference.

(4C) Where a fund is set up under section 14(4B), Ofcom shall require that any person who is granted a licence takes action to inform its customers of the risk that its devices may lead to interference with medical or hearing technology.””

This new clause would place a duty on Ofcom to carry out tests in advance of the sale of radio frequencies to ensure that any interference identified with medical or hearing devices is made public. Where a risk of interference is identified, Ofcom shall not grant a wireless telegraphy licence unless action is taken to remove the risk of interference or a fund established to cover the cost of replacing medical or hearing technology affected. This new clause is supported by the National Deaf Children’s Society.

New clause 27—Introduction of broadband connection voucher scheme as alternative to universal service order provision—

“The Secretary of State shall introduce a broadband connection voucher scheme to allow an end-user to access broadband other than that supplied by the provider of the universal service order, under Part 2 of the Communications Act 2003.”

Although most individuals are likely to choose the standard universal service order offering, this new clause would provide individuals with the option of a voucher scheme that empowers them to take up an alternative solution.

Government amendments 23 and 24.

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

The Digital Economy Bill will help to connect modern Britain, support the digital economy and keep people safe online. The measures in this group are about strengthening the enforcement of protections for children, improving access to online media, and addressing consumer protection in telecoms. I will take in turn those three sub-groups of your excellent grouping, Mr Speaker.

Turning first to child protection, I am delighted by the cross-party support for delivering the Conservative manifesto commitment to require age verification to access online pornography. During the Bill’s passage through the House, my hon. Friend Claire Perry, who is in the Chamber, ably supported by my hon. Friend Kit Malthouse, has led debate about this by powerfully expressing the view that the enforcement proposed in the Bill is not strong enough—she is right. We have listened to the case that she and others have made. They have advanced the argument that some companies, especially those based overseas, simply will not abide by the law that is enacted by this House, so it is clear that there is a case to direct a UK internet service provider to prevent access.

We all want the internet to be free, but freedom operates within a framework of social responsibility, norms and the law. The approach set out in Government new clause 28 will protect the freedom of adults to watch pornography online, but provide adequate protections by giving children the same sorts of safeguards online as they have offline. We have worked closely with the industry and I am confident that it will take a responsible position. I therefore envisage the regulator needing to use this power only sparingly, because the vast majority of companies will want to obey the law. We will work through the technical detail with the regulator—it is expected to be the British Board of Film Classification—and others to understand the broader implications and make the new system work as we take the proposals through the other place.

We have been persuaded of another argument that was made powerfully on Second Reading. The provisions we have discussed today will see children protected by one of the most robust and sophisticated regimes globally but, as my hon. Friend Fiona Bruce—I see her in her place—has said, supported by my hon. Friend Derek Thomas and David Simpson, the protections have resulted in a disparity between UK-based on-demand services on the one hand, and overseas-based on-demand services and online commercial providers of pornography on the other. We have carefully considered that and concluded that we do not want disparate regimes. Government new clause 29 will ensure that children are protected from pornographic content from wherever it is derived. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton for making her case; I believe that we will have a stronger system as a result.

New clause 3 proposes a legal requirement to undertake an online safety impact assessment. I understand the intent behind the new clause, but I think that the measure is unnecessary, because leading social media companies already report on their online safety practices voluntarily as part of the safety framework of the ICT Coalition. We work closely with social media companies to ensure that they take down content that is violent or that incites violence, and to flag terrorist-related content. The system is important and is working well. Since 2010, we have secured the voluntary removal of more than 220,000 pieces of content. A requirement for a safety assessment is likely to be difficult to apply in practice because of the extraterritorial organisations that are involved in this space, and it would be almost impossible to target individuals who run small online websites for commercial purposes.

Photo of Helen Goodman Helen Goodman Labour, Bishop Auckland

I am grateful to the Minister for agreeing to amend the Bill in this important area. As he is addressing the responsibility of social media sites, what action is he thinking of taking to prevent what happened recently, when Facebook refused to give the police information that it had relating to a missing child?

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

It is incredibly important to get the framework that operates in that sort of space right, as is the case for terrorist material and child protection online. The system that we have in place—it is essentially non-statutory, although it is underpinned by online and offline offences—is working well. Social media organisations’ collaboration with the police and others is incredibly important, and I urge them to collaborate with the police whenever they are asked to do so. We have taken the view that the effective and rigorous enforcement of rules relating to age verification is an important step to get that system up and running. The system is working well, with 220,000 take-downs since 2010, so we want to leave it in place. In all such instances, there might be difficult individual cases, but overall the system is, on the whole, working effectively. That is why we have taken different approaches for the two different areas.

New clause 10 would introduce some very specific requirements around online education. I maintain that the measure is not necessary, because e-safety is already covered at all stages in the new computing curriculum that was introduced in September 2014. From primary school, children are taught how to use technology safely, respectfully and responsibly, how to keep personal information private, how to recognise acceptable and unacceptable behaviour, and how to report a range of concerns. As hon. Members will see, we care deeply about protecting children online both through direct rules for the internet and through education. The new clause is not necessary, and I worry that putting in place a more static system would risk making the task at hand harder.

When it comes to broader protection, we expect social media and interactive services to have in place robust processes that can quickly address inappropriate content and abusive behaviour on their sites. It would be difficult to make the sort of statutory code of practice proposed in new clause 13 work, as there is not a one-size-fits-all solution. The way in which to deal properly with inappropriate content and abuse will vary by service and by incident. Technological considerations might differ by platform as innovation changes the way in which the internet operates. Legislating in this area is difficult because of the pace of change, and users will benefit most if companies develop a bespoke approach for reporting tools and in-house processes. Existing arrangements and the action taken by social media companies provide the best approach to tackling this problem.

Photo of Maria Miller Maria Miller Chair, Women and Equalities Committee, Chair, Women and Equalities Committee

Will the Minister tell us which companies and sectors already have a code of practice in place? How he is monitoring whether such codes of practice are being brought up to date?

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

We are working on codes of practice in a series of different areas. About 10 days ago, as my right hon. Friend will have seen, Twitter—one of the main players in this space—brought forward work towards a code of practice on online abuse. There is more to do in this area, but it is better that we have codes of practice that the organisations themselves can buy into and that can change with the times as the usage of social media changes. My goodness, we all know how social media changes over time—not always in a good way—so we need to make sure that we keep pace with that. I worry that putting something static into legislation would get into the way of such efforts. However, I agree with my right hon. Friend that it is incumbent on social media companies to play their part in establishing and rigorously enforcing norms and social responsibility in this area if we decide not to go down, or not yet to go down, the legislative route.

Photo of Rob Marris Rob Marris Labour, Wolverhampton South West

I quite understand that the Minister wants buy-in from the commercial social media platform providers. In response to Mrs Miller, he sketched out a position that appears to be that there is no actual code of practice, but that codes are being developed. Perhaps I misunderstood the Minister because I thought he had said before the right hon. Lady’s intervention that codes of practice are in place and working well.

I will quickly mention the changing circumstances. The Minister is quite right that this is a fast-changing world. Subsection (4) of new clause 13 states:

“The relevant Minister may from time to time revise and re-issue the code of practice”, so the very flexibility that he is praying in aid would be delivered by the new clause.

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

Let me be clear: when I said that there are codes of practice, I was talking about taking down online terrorist and child abuse material, on which there have been clear codes of practice for a number of years. Regarding social abuse online, we are working with the companies involved to make further progress.

Photo of Ian Lucas Ian Lucas Labour, Wrexham

The Minister is being very generous in giving way. He mentioned the computing curriculum, which I assume relates only to England. What discussions has he had with the devolved nations about these issues?

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

The Government have had significant discussions with the devolved nations on these questions. They, of course, treat these questions differently—there is a different system in Scotland and Wales, and in Northern Ireland in fact—and it is a matter for them. The hon. Gentleman is quite right that the response I gave about the computing curriculum is a matter for England, although most of the Bill involves UK matters. I am very happy to clear up that point.

The Public Bill Committee considered the subject matter of new clause 32, which calls for the regulator to approve age-verification providers and to publish a code of practice with which the providers must comply. As I said in Committee, such a measure is not necessary because clause 15 requires the regulator to publish guidance about the types of arrangements it will treat as being in compliance. That may include the characteristics of age-verification controls that would be considered acceptable. I have been made aware of a number of proposed technical solutions for age-verification controls during the passage of the Bill. Clause 15 already takes into account the need for guidance in that area.

Photo of Alistair Carmichael Alistair Carmichael Liberal Democrat Spokesperson (Home Affairs) 5:00, 28 November 2016

The Minister will be aware that such age verification will inevitably require the companies concerned to hold a lot of data. What assurances can he give the House that those data will not be liable to being hacked, as happened in the Ashley Madison case?

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

That is incredibly important. We will come on to the data protection provisions later, but this whole area operates within the scope of the Data Protection Act 1998, which provides for very strong safeguards that are set to get stronger. The Government have said that we will opt in to the forthcoming general data protection regulation, which includes stronger enforcement measures than the current Data Protection Act. All the data measures in the Bill, and all the consequences of the age-verification process, will be covered by the Data Protection Act, which has a very broad consensus of support behind it and has operated effectively over a number of years. That means that companies are responsible for the security of their data, including their cyber-security.

Photo of Alistair Carmichael Alistair Carmichael Liberal Democrat Spokesperson (Home Affairs)

Will the data therefore be held in an anonymised form that will not allow the people who have provided them to be identified, should the data be stolen? The best security in the world can still be breached?

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

It will be a requirement that the data are held in such a way that they are secure and not made available. It is a common principle across swathes of life that data must be held safely. The Data Protection Act is in place to make sure that that happens.

Returning to new clause 32, it is likely that a requirement on the regulator to approve providers would be unnecessarily restrictive. However, I understand of course the need to ensure that the age-verification process is of high quality.

As I have stressed, these measures are part of a broader effort to protect children online. For instance, parental control filters are an important tool to protect children from harmful online material. They were introduced by industry after the efforts of my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes in the previous Parliament. In Committee, we discussed the concern that EU net neutrality regulations will render such controls, which have worked well, illegal. I am clear that our interpretation of the EU regulations is that filters are allowed when they can be turned off, as they are therefore a matter of user choice. I know that there is still uncertainty about this matter, as well as concerns that filters could be challenged. I am happy to confirm to the House that, to put this issue beyond doubt, we will table an amendment in the other place to the effect that providers may offer such filters.

Amendments 27 to 34 have been tabled by my right hon. Friend Mrs Miller, the former Secretary of State. The introduction of a new law requiring appropriate age-verification measures for online pornography is a bold step involving many challenges. It represents the first stage in ensuring that commercial providers of pornographic material are rightly held responsible for what they provide and profit from. While the internet brings incredible and unlimited opportunities, it has the potential to change the way in which younger generations grow up to understand and experience healthy relationships.

Delivering on our manifesto commitment to stop children and young people from accessing online pornographic sites remains our priority, and we want to get that right. I believe that the provisions in the Bill will enable us to do that. Our measures will protect children from exposure to material that is clearly inappropriate for them and that would be harmful to their development. Of course, pornography is not the only online content that may be harmful to children, but AV controls are part, not all, of the approach to protect children from possibly harmful content online.

The inclusion of other adult material within the scope of the Bill, as proposed in amendment 27, might not be the most effective way to address these issues. Most importantly, we must be careful to take a proportionate approach to ensure the success of our proposals. I assure my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke that we will continue to work to make sure that we take all action necessary on all fronts where children are at risk of harm. I look forward to continuing discussions with her and others. I believe our approach is a targeted and effective way of protecting children from accessing or stumbling across the pornographic material that is most readily available and potentially harmful, and that the Bill fulfils our manifesto commitment.

Photo of John Whittingdale John Whittingdale Conservative, Maldon

My right hon. Friend will be aware that one means by which young people are, more and more, accessing pornography is social media and sites such as Twitter. How will his age verification requirements apply to Twitter?

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

The age verification requirements apply to the commercial provision of pornography. That is not only the paid-for but that which is provided for a commercial return. There is a difference between websites that provide commercial pornography and platforms on which others can upload images. Getting this right with regard to that second group is much harder than it is with regard to the first. We are therefore proposing to put forward the measures in the Bill to deal with the larger swathe or mainstay of the problem, get them working properly and then see how they are working.

I appreciate that there is a big challenge in stopping those who really want to access porn online, but all the evidence suggests that children’s first interaction is often by accident. We are legislating to prevent as much as possible of that inadvertent viewing by those who are not desperately actively seeking to do so. I appreciate that the Bill is not a utopia, but it is a very important step forward. I hope my right hon. Friend will accept that.

Photo of Maria Miller Maria Miller Chair, Women and Equalities Committee, Chair, Women and Equalities Committee

The Minister is being very generous with his time. Is it not fair to say that four years ago providers such as Twitter told us it was impossible to take down visual images of children being sexually abused, but now, as he says, there is quite rightly a code of practice in place? Surely where there is a will there is a way. He has already proved that he can make significant progress, so should he not put more pressure on organisations like Twitter?

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

Yes is the short answer. The Bill does so, and we will best achieve that pressure by delivering on its proposals and then working with the platforms on the issue of platform-based pornography, because that is a much more difficult technical nut to crack.

Photo of Fiona Mactaggart Fiona Mactaggart Labour, Slough

The Minister has spent more time in the past few weeks thinking about children and pornography than I am sure he wanted to. The Bill deals with the publication of pornography, but we also need to help children to be more resilient and understand that those images are not normal sexual behaviour and are the kind of violence that should not be part of relationships, because research by the NSPCC and others tells us that children, and boys in particular, think it is normal. What discussions has he had with the Department for Education to try to build greater resilience among children to some of the images that, despite the efforts in the Bill, they will see?

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

I agree with every word of the right hon. Lady’s intervention—both the first part and the second. Yes, working with the DFE is incredibly important in building resilience and actively ensuring that people’s health through relationships is taught effectively. The Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport and I have both been in discussions with the DFE on that point. That said, Fiona Mactaggart makes an important point about the broader circumstances that should be taken into consideration, as well as the clarity in the amendment, which I hope she welcomes.

Turning to mobile phone contracts—a bit of a shift—new clause 7 seeks to place a mandatory obligation on mobile phone service providers to agree with the customer at the time of their entering into a contract a financial cap on their monthly bill. Since the new clause was first tabled in Committee, we have had further contact with mobile network operators, and providers already offer consumers ways to manage their usage: apps that allow customers to turn financial caps on and off, warning text messages when customers are approaching their allowance limits, dedicated phone numbers that tell the customer their usage, and online tools that explain how much data is needed to carry out different online activities. I expect providers to continue to take steps to minimise bill shock and ensure that their customers are sufficiently equipped to manage their usage, but I am sure that Louise Haigh will agree that legislation is not currently necessary, although the movement in this direction is.

On new clause 14, I understand the frustrations of people whose mobile experience does not live up to their expectations, but while roaming appears to offer a quick fix, it risks doing more harm than good, because it could undermine the incentive for operators to invest in new infrastructure. This is particularly damaging in areas with no coverage from any provider at all. There is no incentive to invest capital in a new mast if operators can by law simply piggyback off others’ investment. The Government considered roaming in 2014, but for the above reasons it was rejected in favour of licence conditions to drive increased coverage by all mobile operators.

That agreement locked in £5 billion of investment to deliver improved coverage across the UK, and we now have 4G coverage to 97.8% of UK premises. I can confirm that this is happening: a mast was turned on just last weekend in my own constituency, and coverage on the road to Newmarket from my house is now better than it ever has been—so I have seen it for myself. The House will also have seen the recent announcements from mobile providers that they are expanding coverage to meet their 90% landmass requirements, which they must now meet under the contracts in their licence agreements. The Bill strengthens the fines they face if they miss those agreements. Of course, however, we want further improvements. Last week, new planning laws came into force to allow taller masts, and we are reforming the electronic communications code in the Bill to help operators to extend their networks, making mast-sharing easier and infrastructure deployment cheaper. These reforms have been widely welcomed by industry, and Ofcom will hold providers to account for the delivery of wider geographic coverage.

New clauses 20 and 25 seek to place mandatory obligations on mobile phone service providers to allow an end user to terminate their contract upon their being unable to obtain a mobile signal at their main residence or main place of employment. Existing consumer protections are already in place, while the automatic compensation measures in clause 3 strengthen Ofcom’s powers to require automatic compensation when there is a complete failure to provide a contracted service. I think that the ability to break a contract when one’s signal is not good enough at home is already dealt with, as contracts purchased at distance can be cancelled under the statutory 14-day cooling-off period, while for “in shop” purchases there is often a “check your coverage” cooling-off period for the first two weeks after sign up. Some providers also offer extended periods to ensure that the service meets needs, with the option of cancellation without penalty.

Photo of Grant Shapps Grant Shapps Conservative, Welwyn Hatfield

Does my right hon. Friend accept that this must be the only product that someone can buy and end up not being able to use? People do not just move house during the first 14 days of a contract; it can happen at any time during the two years of a contract. Will he look again at this?

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

I want to tackle this problem primarily by achieving universal mobile phone coverage for UK properties, and we are on track to hit 98%. By comparison, the universal broadcasting service requires 98.5%. We are getting to the point where we have near-universal service, but that is not necessarily good enough. With the forthcoming Green Paper on consumers and markets in mind, I propose to work with my right hon. Friend to make sure that it addresses the issues of concern, so that we ensure that consumers get a good deal from their mobile phone contracts and that those contracts will work.

Photo of Chris Bryant Chris Bryant Labour, Rhondda 5:15, 28 November 2016

I hear all these statistics about the level of coverage there is meant to be here, there and everywhere, but they never seem to match the reality on the ground or in the living room or in the shop. I live in the town of Porth in the Rhondda, and through the main street almost right through the town there is absolutely no mobile coverage from any of the companies, so it does not matter whether one of them is providing a good enough service—none of them are.

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

No doubt the hon. Gentleman will share my deep frustration over the fact that when mobile phone 3G licences were auctioned in the early 2000s, in order to get a big return to the Treasury they were auctioned without geographic coverage requirements. I think that was a serious mistake for this country. We have since engineered into the licence agreements mobile phone geographical coverage of 90%. The geography that is being covered is rising rapidly at the moment. For instance, one provider had 50% coverage last year; it is 75% now, and it has to get up to 90%. That shows how it is increasing. It is pity that from the period of the 3G licence in the early 2000s up to 2014, there were no requirements for geographic coverage, which meant that we fell behind. Thankfully, we are now catching up. As the head of Ofcom has confirmed to the Select Committee, we are in discussions with the mobile operators about getting to a universal 100% geographical coverage in the next licence period.

Photo of Chris Bryant Chris Bryant Labour, Rhondda

I am not trying to make a partisan point, but I think the Minister was trying to there. All I am saying is that even with the changes to the electronic communication codes that are in the Bill, I do not think we will be able to achieve that 98% or 100% coverage, because it is still too easy for an individual landholder to make it difficult for significant improvements to be made to the infrastructure in the area. Surely we should now be seeing access to mobile telephony as the same as access to water.

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

I am not making a partisan point at all. In fact, after cheering on Ed Balls on Saturday night, I am feeling about as unpartisan as I ever have! I send him my condolences.

I am speaking out of a deep frustration over the lack of geographic coverage by mobile phones in the UK. If I may say so, my constituency is significantly more rural than the hon. Gentleman’s, and this is a real problem in constituencies up and down the country. I look forward to my campaigning visit to the shortly marginal seat of Rhondda.

Photo of Damian Collins Damian Collins Chair, Culture, Media and Sport Committee

I, too, was pleased to hear Ofcom say in front of the Select Committee that it and the Government were looking at a universal service obligation for 3G and 4G phone signals. Does the Minister agree that there is sometimes a real frustration in communities where the statistics suggest that they have been covered, but local topography means that the mast signal does not reach homes? If the Minister visited Elham Valley in my constituency, he would meet people who suffer in that way.

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

Well, I have news for my hon. Friend. Next month, Ofcom will publish data for both fixed-line broadband and mobile phone coverage at the premise level for each individual premise. If the supposed coverage is different from what Ofcom says, there will be a mechanism to feed that back so that we get a proper map of coverage in both those respects. I look forward enormously to that happening, and I am sure that the Select Committee will investigate that data with great aplomb.

Photo of Simon Hoare Simon Hoare Conservative, North Dorset

I ask the Minister to ensure that proper discussion takes place with the Department for Communities and Local Government so that the most sensible, but liberal, planning regime for new mobile telephone masts is in place in order to provide what amounts to a basic technological requirement.

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

Yes, and the new rules came into place last week. Nobody prayed against the statutory instruments in either House, so there was unanimous support for a more liberal planning regime. If my hon. Friend would like to work with me on what steps might be needed to improve the planning regime further, I am all his.

Photo of Rob Marris Rob Marris Labour, Wolverhampton South West

The Minister is being very generous, but may I caution him and press him a little on the methodology of the “premises by premises” survey? I live in a dense urban area. The coverage is nominally 4G, but I check my phone periodically, and I see that sometimes I get 3G and sometimes I get 4G. What will the premises survey say about properties like mine? I am paying for 4G, and it is the future, but I am not getting it all the time.

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

I would say that 5G is the future. As for the hon. Gentleman’s substantive point, I do not want the debate to turn into a seminar on mobile connectivity, but those in the industry have a wonderful phrase for the phenomenon that occurs as more people use data over a particular mast: they say that the coverage “breathes”. In other words, it comes in and goes out as other people use the data. Of course, at any one point in time the coverage may be different. The very best people to conduct the analysis are those at Ofcom, and they are conducting it, so I think it best for us to engage in this particular debate once they have published the “premises by premises” data.

Photo of Grant Shapps Grant Shapps Conservative, Welwyn Hatfield

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for his offer to incorporate some of the issues raised by the new clauses in the Green Paper. He says that those at Ofcom are the best people to make the decisions. No one in the House, indeed no one in the country, will believe Ofcom’s claim that nearly 98% of UK premises are covered. It does not stack up with reality, and it does not stack up with what the British Infrastructure Group of Members of Parliament found either. I appeal to the Minister to ensure that he does not himself start to believe this nonsense.

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

I am looking forward to seeing the data for exactly that reason. In my rural constituency, I can drive for 10 minutes without getting a signal at all—that includes driving past houses—and the same probably applies to many other people. The lived experience is critical to judging whether the figures are broadly correct. I am entirely with my right hon. Friend on that. My job, and our job in the House, is to hold the mobile network operators to account and ensure that they deliver high-quality geographic coverage, whether it is in Rhondda, Welwyn, in Suffolk or, indeed, in Buckinghamshire, Mr Speaker.

Photo of Calum Kerr Calum Kerr Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Environment and Rural Affairs), Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Digital)

May I make what I hope is a quick, constructive point? May I urge all Members to encourage their constituents to download the Ofcom android app, which is specifically designed to gather data so that we can be better informed, and to publicise it in their constituencies?

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

Quite so. As you may say yourself, Mr Speaker, I am not sure that that is entirely a matter for the Bill, but the hon. Gentleman has made his point.

New clauses 21, 22 and 27, tabled by Plaid Cymru and Scottish National party Members, are not necessary, because they call for what is already the position. New clause 21 is not necessary because it is already a requirement that when emergency services network sites are used to provide coverage for the public, they must be made available to all mobile network operators. New clause 22 is not necessary because Ofcom already has the power to impose structural separation on BT Openreach if it considers that that is required. New clause 27 is not necessary because there is already a universal service obligation in the Bill to take high-speed broadband to all premises. I hope that we can use that as the means to deliver the goals that we no doubt share.

As for new clause 26, the Government take the issue of interference with assistive listening devices very seriously, and we will work with Ofcom to take appropriate action when harmful interference with such devices has been identified. I have met representatives of the National Deaf Children’s Society, and I can tell the House that further testing will begin next month and Ofcom will publish its findings by April 2017. I hope that we are making some progress on that important matter.

Photo of Richard Fuller Richard Fuller Conservative, Bedford

I am very encouraged by what the Minister has said about gathering further information. There is a particular issue for deaf children because of the way in which they learn. Interference from the spectrum can have a deleterious effect on their education. Will the Minister pay particular attention to the impact on children in schools?

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

Of course I will. I have discussed that precise issue with the National Deaf Children’s Society, and I will continue to work on it.

Government amendments 23 and 24 are detailed technical amendments concerning the installation of electronic communications apparatus on tidal land owned by the Crown.

I hope that, following my explanations and the commitments I have given, Members will withdraw their amendments and new clauses.

Photo of Kevin Brennan Kevin Brennan Shadow Minister (Culture, Media and Sport) (Arts and Heritage)

I rise to speak to new clauses 10, 32 and 7, which stand in my name and those of my hon. Friends, the Government new clauses, which the Minister has outlined, and new clause 1, tabled by Claire Perry, whom the Minister mentioned. I will also refer to some of the other amendments in the group.

In Committee, Labour Members, and indeed the hon. Lady, made it clear that we could not see how age verification could operate without a backstop power to block sites that failed to comply. In Committee, the Minister resisted that strongly. He said:

“The powers are not a silver bullet;
sites that were actively trying to avoid the Bill’s other enforcement measures would also be able to actively avoid these measures. It is questionable how much additional enforcement power they would bring, given those downsides.”

He went on to say:

“I think the Bill has ended up with the correct balance.” —[Official Report, Digital Economy Public Bill Committee, 20 October 2016; c. 209.]

Clearly, the Secretary of State disagreed with him on that. She has now overruled her junior Minister by tabling new clauses 28 and 29 in her name, as we can see on the amendment paper. The new clauses tabled by the Secretary of State, who unfortunately is no longer in her place, represent significant changes at quite a late stage in the passage of the Bill in the Commons, confirming our contention that the Bill as published was not ready to leave home when it was allowed to do so.

Photo of Claire Perry Claire Perry Conservative, Devizes

As the hon. Gentleman knows from his ministerial experience, it is the job of junior, middle-ranking Ministers to do all the work and Secretaries of State to take all the credit. In this case, I assure him that the ears of all the Government Front Benchers were open to the changes that he and I wanted to make.

Photo of Kevin Brennan Kevin Brennan Shadow Minister (Culture, Media and Sport) (Arts and Heritage)

I am grateful for that intervention. All I can say is that I have just given the Secretary of State credit for the change, as the hon. Lady suggests I should.

The new clauses introduce significant changes at this late stage in the consideration of the Bill. We support blocking, but concerns have been raised about them in the press that they go beyond a backstop power to block sites to under-18s and could be used in practice to extend internet censorship to adults. The Government need to be clear whether that is the intention of the new clauses.

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

I have also seen those reports. I think that they misread the Bill. That is neither our intention, nor our understanding of the working of the new clauses.

Photo of Kevin Brennan Kevin Brennan Shadow Minister (Culture, Media and Sport) (Arts and Heritage)

It is helpful to have that on the record. No doubt, the new clauses will be pored over in a lot more detail after they arrive in the other place. Given our time constraints today, I want to put on the record our concern that we did not have an opportunity in Committee to pore over such proposals; had the Bill been ready, perhaps we would have had. Notwithstanding our support for blocking, we think a lot more scrutiny will be required when there is more time available in the other place to discuss these Government new clauses, on the assumption that the House passes them tonight.

We have argued repeatedly that the Bill should have prepared the UK for the challenges faced by the digital economy and, crucially, should have featured digital resilience as a key part of the provisions. The opportunities of the digital economy cannot be exploited unless we feel safe and secure online, and that is nowhere more important and clear than with our children.

Children are growing up in the midst of an information revolution that, even a decade ago, was unimaginable, with instant access to an astonishing range of content and information. Today’s children are taking in an astonishing five times more information than the generation that grew up in the not so distant 1990s. So, far from tabloid stories about a distracted generation, those growing up today are in some ways on course to be the most informed generation in history. But of course knowledge is not understanding, and wisdom comes in part from experience.

The challenges of this digital revolution for protecting our children cannot be ignored, and they are challenges parents across the country worry about every single day. They are worried they may not know what their children are being subjected to online, whether bullying or coming across inappropriate images, and as their children come to know much more about the online world than they do, parents feel they may not be best placed to stop it.

Our new clause 10 would help us all face up to that challenge. It would amend the Education Act 1996, so that secondary school pupils would be taught in an age-appropriate way and with the usual safeguards which apply to that Act about the dangers of the online world and how to keep safe. With digital devices more widespread among children than ever before and with five to 15-year-olds spending an average of 20 hours and six minutes online every week, having no clear education to sit alongside the blunt instrument of age verification is an important missing part of the Bill.

Age verification for online pornography to stop children seeing harmful content is of course welcome in the Bill, but, as the Minister himself hinted, it is not the whole answer. We can build a swimming pool, fill it with water, build a fence around it and put up a sign saying swimming is dangerous, but the most important thing is to teach our children to swim. If we solely rely on age verification as the main way to tackle this problem, that is going to be inadequate. Age verification cannot teach children consent or about healthy relationships, or help them to navigate the expectations placed on them and reinforced online; that can only be done through well-devised and taught sex and relationship education, which incorporates discussions about online pornography, so that children can question what they see online in a safe environment.

A recent NSPCC report into the effect of online pornography on under-18s was revealing and troubling. It found that most of them felt that it was a poor model for consent and practising safe sex and that it could distort their image of a healthy relationship. But the Government have so far refused to even consider statutory online sexual education, and their recent “Keeping children safe” strategy dedicated only three paragraphs to the online world. Taking that in tandem with the Bill, which does not make a single mention of online abuse or online education, it seems that Ministers are ducking the challenge —or perhaps they are not able to comprehend it.

We have always known education in this area matters. It is why when we were in government we expanded and updated sex education and commissioned the Tanya Byron review, whose lessons were largely abandoned after 2010. That is also why in the Bill we want to take steps towards developing statutory online education for this smartphone generation. We want it to extend beyond simple sex education to the entire online world, so that children, who, as many people say, are digital natives, can make safe and informed decisions.

With an 800% increase in the number of children contacting the NSPCC about online abuse, it is clear this is becoming a real problem for today’s schoolchildren. They clearly need more support and more advice, and someone to turn to. Statutory online education would work in tandem with a code of conduct for social media providers to prevent online abuse.

Photo of Maria Miller Maria Miller Chair, Women and Equalities Committee, Chair, Women and Equalities Committee 5:30, 28 November 2016

I am attracted to the shadow Minister’s proposal because I, too, feel more needs to be done to educate children in this area, but I am concerned that it is talking about internet pornography in isolation and potentially will not address the problems he is trying to address in his remarks, which go far broader than simply internet pornography.

Photo of Kevin Brennan Kevin Brennan Shadow Minister (Culture, Media and Sport) (Arts and Heritage)

I would certainly welcome the right hon. Lady’s support for a wider amendment and for a wider change in Government policy in this area, because a problem does exist. Our proposals have had to be drawn up to be within the scope of the Digital Economy Bill. In Committee, we were unable to table an amendment that was in scope, so I am incredibly grateful that we have been able to get one in scope and within the confines of the Bill today.

Photo of Rob Marris Rob Marris Labour, Wolverhampton South West

I entirely support my hon. Friend. I suspect that his experience of going round schools—particularly secondary schools—will be similar to mine. Among the things that bedevil teachers are mobile phones, online bullying and sexting, but the teachers—God bless ’em—often do not have the training to deal with those issues. Although they have the best intentions, they sometimes fumble in their attempts to help. Having these measures structured into the curriculum would help just about every secondary schoolteacher, even if they did not have to teach these things.

Photo of Kevin Brennan Kevin Brennan Shadow Minister (Culture, Media and Sport) (Arts and Heritage)

My hon. Friend makes a valuable point. I am a former teacher—from the analogue age, I hasten to add—and I have no doubt that many teachers who started their careers around the same time as I did would fall into that category.

Statutory online education could work in tandem, as I have said, but protecting our children is a major challenge and it cannot happen without education. That is why I was disappointed that the Minister chose not to support our proposal. I believe that it represents the other side of the coin to what the Government are trying to achieve through age verification. We contend that our measures are necessary, and we will therefore divide the House on this matter if we have to.

Our new clause 32 would oblige the age verification regulator to ensure that all age verification providers—the companies that put the tools on websites to ensure compliance—were approved by the regulator. It would also oblige those providers to perform a data protection impact assessment and to make it publicly available, as well as to perform an array of other duties. The new clause is designed to address concerns about the practicality of age verification checks. It would ensure that only minimal data were required, that those data were kept secure and that individuals’ liberty and privacy were protected.

We have not been reassured by the Minister’s comments, either in Committee or today, that the fact that age verification software is improving is enough. We should be able to guarantee the privacy of an individual before the verification tool comes into force. We are not asking anything unreasonable of the regulator or of the age verification providers. The principles of privacy, anonymity and proportionality should underpin the age verification tool, but as far as I am aware, they have not as yet featured in any draft guidance, codes of practice or documents accompanying the Bill.

If anyone thinks I am being partisan, I can tell them that the Information Commissioner agrees with me on this. In its response to the Department’s consultation on age verification for pornography, the Information Commissioner’s Office stated:

The Commissioner’s concern is that any solution implemented must be compliant with the requirements of the DPA and PECR.”

That refers to the Data Protection Act 1998 and the Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003 that sit alongside it.

Photo of Kevin Brennan Kevin Brennan Shadow Minister (Culture, Media and Sport) (Arts and Heritage)

I will finish the quote, then I will give way. The Information Commissioner’s response went on:

“The concept of ‘privacy by design’ would seem particularly relevant in the context of age verification—that is, designing a system that appropriately respects individuals’ privacy whilst achieving the stated aim. In practical terms, this would mean only collecting and recording the minimum data required in the circumstances, having assessed what that minimum was. It would also mean ensuring that the purposes for which any data is used are carefully and restrictively defined, and that any activities keep to those restricted purposes. In the context of preventing children from accessing online commercial pornography, there is a clear attribute which needs to be proven in each case—that is, whether an individual’s age is above the required threshold. Any solution considered needs to be focussed on proving the existence or absence of that attribute, to the exclusion of other more detailed information”—

[Interruption.] I will go on for a lot longer if the Minister keeps making gestures at me. The quote concludes:

“Any solution considered needs to be focussed on proving the existence or absence of that attribute, to the exclusion of other more detailed information (such as actual date of birth).”

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way; I just want to clear up this point. When this question was asked while I was on my feet, I responded by saying that the Data Protection Act, as cited by the ICO, is the legal framework for delivering this. The further quotes that the hon. Gentleman read out outline how the Act would operate in this case. In a sense, therefore, those quotes prove the point that the required legislation for ensuring protection of data already exists in the Data Protection Act and other measures.

Photo of Kevin Brennan Kevin Brennan Shadow Minister (Culture, Media and Sport) (Arts and Heritage)

We will see whether the Information Commissioner agrees. She made it clear that she would have

“significant concerns about any method of age verification that requires the collection and retention of documents such as a copy of passports, driving licences or other documents (of those above the age threshold) which are vulnerable to misuse and/or attractive to disreputable third parties.”

The Minister gave no real reason in his intervention about why he does not support new clause 32, which would provide that reassurance.

The risks of creating databases that potentially contain people’s names, locations, credit card details—you name it—alongside their pornographic preferences are clear. Our priority here is the protection of children and that is agreed across the House, but one consequence of the recent hack that was mentioned by Mr Carmichael was the number of suicides. We should take things seriously and proceed with caution before creating anything that would result in the storing of data that could be leaked, hacked or commercialised that would otherwise be completely private and legitimate. That is the reasoning behind our reasonable, straightforward new clause, which the Minister rejects. It would place a series of duties on the age verification regulator to ensure that adequate privacy standards were applied, that any data obtained or stored were not for commercial use and that security was given due and proper consideration.

New clause 7 would mean that mobile phone service providers give all consumers the opportunity to place a financial cap on their monthly bill and that a mobile phone service cannot be provided until the service provider has put in place a cap of the agreed amount if the consumer has made an express request. Again, the Minister’s arguments, both in Committee and today, were nowhere near sufficient. The new clause would be welcomed by the many who have found that when they receive an email or check their bank balance at the end of the month, their mobile phone bill has come in much higher than expected. Mobile tariffs are complex, particularly on data, and few of us actually understand how much data we need for an average month. Consumers of all kinds can find that they use much more data than they expected.

Citizens Advice provided an example that reveals the problems. One of its clients changed his shift pattern and started using his mobile phone to watch films. He then received a text message saying that he had gone over his monthly allowance. He did not think too much about it until he received a bill for more than £2,000 at the end of the month. Unsurprisingly, his service was subsequently cut off. Research suggests that as many as one in five consumers find it difficult to keep track of how much they spend on data. The average unexpectedly high bill is often double the cost of the original monthly fee.

Photo of Helen Goodman Helen Goodman Labour, Bishop Auckland

Another problem with the unpredictability is that people under some contracts pay for what they receive—what other people send in texts, emails and so on—but that is not under their control.

Photo of Kevin Brennan Kevin Brennan Shadow Minister (Culture, Media and Sport) (Arts and Heritage)

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is why new clause 7 is so helpful. Consumers could prevent that from happening by voluntarily asking for a cap. Citizens Advice received more than 60,000 inquiries about telephone and broadband debt, with its in-debt specialists dealing with nearly 27,000 individual mobile phone debt cases. Consumers support the measure, with more than 77% of them welcoming the idea.

This is not the first time such a proposal has been considered: in 2012, Ofcom considered introducing regulations but could not overcome the objections of providers, who argued it would be too costly. In fact, the lack of regulation is what has proved too costly—too costly for struggling consumers. Two providers now do what is suggested in our new clause. The Government say they want to help the JAMs—those who are just about managing—so if they fail to support the new clause, it will show they are not serious when they say that.

Photo of Ian Lucas Ian Lucas Labour, Wrexham 5:45, 28 November 2016

I strongly support this proposal and the new clause. Constituents have contacted me specifically about this point, because the complexity of the tariffs and the lack of knowledge about what makes up the information and the cost is huge for consumers, and this proposal would be a major step forward for them.

Photo of Kevin Brennan Kevin Brennan Shadow Minister (Culture, Media and Sport) (Arts and Heritage)

I welcome my hon. Friend’s intervention in support of our proposal for caps on mobile phone bills, and so that I do not exceed mine at this point, I will hang up, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Photo of Maria Miller Maria Miller Chair, Women and Equalities Committee, Chair, Women and Equalities Committee

It is a pleasure to follow Kevin Brennan, and I share his regret that it is not possible to address online abuse in this Bill. I hope that the Minister will show the Government’s determination on this issue, as Ministers have done regularly in response to questions on a number of other measures. I particularly noted his response to my intervention about codes of practices. He is right to say that the industry has been able to move swiftly and effectively to deal with issues relating to terrorism and child abuse, but I think issues relating to online abuse more broadly are just as worthy of their attention. I hope that he is clear about the Government’s priorities in this area, to make sure that the industry really does act.

It is an art form to draw the scope of a Bill, and the Minister should get a grade-A medal for drafting the scope of this Bill extremely tightly to make sure that a number of issues that many of us would have liked to have drawn to the attention of the House are not covered by this Bill. That does not, however, mean that they are any the less important.

I really welcome Government new clauses 28 and 29 on the powers to block access to material where age verification is not sufficiently robust. That shows the Government’s intention. They have done well to reflect the intentions of my hon. Friend Claire Perry in her new clause 1 and of my hon. Friend Fiona Bruce. It shows action and energy from Government to try to clean up the internet so that it is safer for children to use. My amendments 27 to 34 raise the question of whether the Government could have gone further in that, although I acknowledge that they are very much adhering to the manifesto commitments we made at the general election.

We have heard from the Minister at length, and I listened carefully, particularly to his response to my amendments. With his usual elegance and wit, he attempted to explain how this Bill can be at odds with Government policy but people can be very happy with it—I may be being a little unkind. He often tells us at the Dispatch Box that what is illegal offline is illegal online too, but it is illegal for children under the age of 18 to view adult material—I refer not just to pornography; as he knows, “adult material” is drawn more broadly than pornography alone. It therefore seems a little arbitrary for us to introduce a new law that makes such a distinction. I do not understand why one needs to be made.

Photo of John Whittingdale John Whittingdale Conservative, Maldon

My right hon. Friend says it is illegal for children to view adult material, but she will be aware that vast amounts of adult material are broadcast by our national broadcasters after the watershed at 10 o’clock, and it is not illegal for children to watch that, although it may be undesirable. How does she propose to deal with BBC iPlayer, ITV Play and 4oD, which broadcast 18 material?

Photo of Maria Miller Maria Miller Chair, Women and Equalities Committee, Chair, Women and Equalities Committee

My right hon. Friend, the former Secretary of State, makes an extremely important point. I suppose that the advantage broadcasters have over the online world is that they can use a notional watershed, although, as he rightly says, that is clearly not the case when it comes to iPlayer. I shall come on to technology that is on our side. Technology has moved on and given us opportunities, which my right hon. Friend would welcome, to make sure that children do not view things that we have said in Parliament are inappropriate.

I gently urge the Minister to consider how he might embrace my amendments in future. The law makes it clear that adult material does not just mean pornography. In response to my right hon. Friend the former Secretary of State, that is the point that I am making. Whether it is extreme violence, beheadings, sadomasochism or other such behaviour or material, it is deemed as adult-related. However, for reasons that are unclear, that is excluded from the Bill. Perhaps the Minister can give me a little more information about why he decided to do that, and assure me that in future that will be dealt with.

I took the time to talk to some primary schoolchildren in my constituency about the sort of things that they came across on the internet. A group of them talked about viewing age-appropriate material—I think it was pictures of small kittens—but at the end material popped up that frightened them to their core. They were young children, and they were not out and out looking for such material—it just popped up. Restrictions and parental controls could be put in place to catch that, but the Minister has an opportunity to make sure that organisations such as YouTube are more careful about advertisements linked to child-related material. That is an important point for him to consider further in relation to my amendments.

Ofcom has done a great deal of work in this area, and the Minister will be well and truly aware of that. It says that this is a significant problem, and that this year, one in 10 under-11s have seen something online that is “worrying, nasty or offensive”. Two thirds of young people think that sites should do more to protect them from that type of adult content. One of the guiding principles of the new regulator, the British Board of Film Classification, is to protect children from harmful media content. We protect them on television, albeit with the problems that my right hon. Friend the former Secretary of State has mentioned, and we protect them in the cinema. In one of the most uncontrolled environments —online—we allow them freely to view things that are far more difficult for us as parents to control. My amendments would help to draw those restrictions and website blocking more broadly if proper age verification procedures are not put in place, and it is worth the Government considering that further.

Ofcom was charged with looking at common media standards four or five years ago, so perhaps the Minister can update the House on the progress that has been made in that area. Can he explain how the new regulator will balance its narrow responsibilities to look solely at pornography with the organisation’s broader remit offline with regard to adult-related material? Organisations such as Childline have to deal daily with the aftermath when young people look at more broadly defined adult material online, as I have said before, in videos of extreme torture, violence, and—this is particularly upsetting—beheadings. My amendments, which have the full support of the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children seek to put safeguards that we take for granted offline into the online world. Content that would require an 18 certificate in a film or video game would be subject to an age-verification system.

The technology exists to do that. We have an incredible IT sector in this country, and it has invented ways to verify age in an anonymised way online, particularly with the use of passport data and biometrics. Companies such as Yoti have developed facial recognition apps linked to passports so that they can make sure, using anonymous data, that individuals are the age that they say they are. These things exist; Parliament does not need to invent them.

Accepting that adult over-18 material should not be viewed by children does not undermine freedom of speech, because we insist on it offline. It does add to costs for businesses, but we accept that cost for offline businesses, and I believe we should accept it for online businesses too. Fundamental rights and freedoms have always been subject to limits within the law, and the amendments simply call for the law relating to adult material in general to apply online, and for children to be protected. People who choose to flout the law should be subject to the same action by the regulator as people who distribute pornography.

I should like briefly to touch on a couple of other amendments in this group. New clause 3, which was tabled by Liz Saville Roberts, talks about the creation of personal accounts and removing anonymity on the internet. I sympathise with the measures that it proposes, but it is as important for non-commercial sites as commercial sites to adopt such a measure, and I do not think that the Bill is the appropriate vehicle for such a change.

New clause 10 was discussed at length by the hon. Member for Cardiff West. As I said in an intervention, I sympathise with the point that he made, because the guidance on sex and relationships education is 16 years out of date. It does not quite pre-date the internet, but it is close to doing so, and it does not address issues such as pornography and the way in which it drives young people’s understanding of relationships—something that no one in the Chamber feels very comfortable with. I do not believe, however, that the Bill is the proper vehicle for him to achieve the objectives that he has set out, as he may well end up distorting the issue, because people might think that we have addressed it with his provision. However, we would not have done so, because the measure deals only with online pornography. He will agree, especially if he has read my Select Committee report on sexual harassment in schools, that any measure to address SRE and its improvement in schools should be drawn much more widely than the internet alone. I hope he will forgive me for not supporting that narrowly drawn provision, although I accept that he probably did not have any choice, given the scope of the Bill—he is absolutely right about that.

I urge the Minister to consider stronger undertakings than those he gave me in his opening statement, given the importance of prohibiting children from viewing adult material in the broader sense, rather than the narrow sense on which the Government have chosen to focus. He has a personal responsibility to children who use the internet day in, day out. We need to make sure that it is a safe place. He has done more than any other Minister today in making the internet a safer place for children such as mine and his, but he needs to do more, so will he give me that undertaking today?

Several hon. Members:

rose—

Photo of Natascha Engel Natascha Engel Deputy Speaker (Second Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means)

A large number of hon. and right hon. Members want to catch my eye. This debate finishes at 6.47pm, so I urge speakers to keep their remarks brief so that everyone can speak. I call George Howarth.

Photo of George Howarth George Howarth Labour, Knowsley 6:00, 28 November 2016

I am grateful, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I shall try to comply with your instructions. It is a great pleasure to follow Mrs Miller, who made a powerful case for her amendments. She certainly has my support.

I shall try to be brief as I talk to a narrow and esoteric part of the Bill. Virgin Media has a workplace in my constituency that employs 250 people. The company has a particular concern which I shall take the liberty of connecting to new clause 27, because it is about the position before that measure could take effect. I am not arguing against new clause 27, which would provide individuals with the option of a voucher scheme that would empower them to take up an alternative solution. It has been tabled on the presumption that most individuals would be likely to choose the standard universal service order offering.

My argument is that in order for that proposal to be successful, there needs to be coverage in the first place to enable people to choose one option or the other. There are a number of obstacles in the way of that happening, and the Bill does not resolve the problem. Virgin Media argues that communications providers should, in effect, be treated the same as utility companies when it comes to being granted access rights or wayleaves from landowners to deploy their infrastructure on their land. The Government talk of broadband as a fourth utility, which generally is the case, but the code reform in the Bill is, in the words of Virgin Media, “a halfway house”.

Under the reforms as currently envisaged, broadband companies would face three drawbacks that water companies do not face and, as a result, higher deployment costs, which I shall say more about in a moment. The first drawback is that communications operators have to pay a rent for accessing land, whereas water companies do not. Instead, they have only to compensate landowners for any loss of value. Secondly, water companies have a right to net off any compensation that they pay with any increase in the value of the land resulting from the fact that sewerage is in place. Communications operators do not have that right, although in some cases they might seem to be carrying sewage of a different kind. Thirdly, water companies notify landowners of their intention to deploy by giving 42 days’ notice, whereas communications operators have to negotiate access with landowners who often have no particular incentive to grant it, which can cause huge delays.

Photo of Rob Marris Rob Marris Labour, Wolverhampton South West

I have great sympathy with what my right hon. Friend is saying. We talk glibly about access to telephony being almost a human right in our country. Obviously we need water to live, and having telephony is not a physiological necessity, but in modern life telephony is a necessity. Some 40% of the Bill is contained in schedule 1, which runs to 60 pages and deals with issues relating to that raised by my right hon. Friend. Does he agree that there is a missed opportunity in schedule 1 of dealing with the particular issue that he raises?

Photo of George Howarth George Howarth Labour, Knowsley

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for pointing that out. Earlier today I waded through schedule 1, after which I was no wiser about its relevance to my argument. He, as a Member with a reputation for having an eye for the fine detail of legislation, will have spotted that in rather less time than it took me.

According to Virgin Media, it costs a communications service provider—Virgin Media or any other—150% more to put in infrastructure than it costs a water company, and 66% more than it costs an electricity company. I do not want to steal the thunder of Calum Kerr, although I condemn him roundly for not using new clause 27 as an opportunity to resolve the problem—that is not a criticism, really—but I ask the Minister to consider this problem before the Bill gets to the House of Lords. I have a handy amendment available if he wants one, but if he does not, I shall try to persuade somebody in another place to table it so that the issue can be more thoroughly debated there.

Photo of Claire Perry Claire Perry Conservative, Devizes

As the House knows, I welcomed part 3 of the Bill on Second Reading, but I did raise, as did many other right hon. and hon. Members, the question of enforcement. We considered the possibility of internet service providers being asked to block sites that disregarded the Government’s requirement for age verification, and I tabled a series of amendments on that point in Committee. I disagree with Kevin Brennan because I think that Ministers absolutely were in listening mode about a manifesto commitment that they were clearly keen to deliver. Against that backdrop, I am delighted to speak on Report by welcoming new clause 28 and Government amendments 35 to 42, which address this critical concern.

The Government had argued for rather a long time that it was disproportionate to make provision for statutory IP blocking because that had been dealt with on a voluntary basis for child pornography—we are all aware of the wonderful work done by the Internet Watch Foundation—and with reference to terrorist material. There was perhaps a hope that internet service providers would voluntarily get involved in blocking sites in the absence of age verification. Many right hon. and hon. Members campaigned for years for the voluntary introduction of family-friendly filters by internet service providers. We have led the world by working across industry and across the Government to produce a sensible set of provisions. We now have online filters that are introduced—in some cases automatically—by ISPs and others on a voluntary basis, and they seem to be working well.

There were, however, significant problems in assuming that ISPs would operate voluntarily. It was not just me and other colleagues in the House who were concerned. Bodies such as Christian Action Research and Education, the Children’s Charities Coalition for Internet Safety, the NSPCC, the British Board of Film Classification, which is now the regulator, and the Digital Policy Alliance were concerned that this sensible provision for age verification would not stick unless there was a more robust enforcement regime.

I am delighted that new clause 1, which I tabled, has been co-signed by 34 colleagues from seven political parties. That demonstrates that although we might like to stand up and shout at each other, our best work is done when we work together on such vital issues. It is a testament to the power of this place that we can work together so effectively to get this done. I know that this is a difficult argument; we have only to look at some of our Twitter feeds to see that. I am no longer on Twitter, but we know from other parts of the internet how difficult these conversations are because they go right to the heart of issues surrounding the regulation of the internet, which grew up, very properly, in a regulation-free environment, and in many respects that environment contributed to its growth and its glory.

Are we asking Governments and companies to restrict legal material for adults? I would argue strongly that the new clause is not about censorship or the restriction of legal access for adults; it is about proving that those who are consuming the material are indeed over 18. The new clause simply puts in place the sort of Government regulation and advice, and corporate socially responsible behaviour, that has been seen in many other industries. Example of that include the watershed in broadcasting, the fact that adult content often sits behind PINs on online media, and restrictions on what children can buy on the high street.

There is also a sense that the argument in relation to child sex abuse images and terrorist material is really not relevant. There is a strong global consensus that images or movie materials relating to neither of those things should be tolerated, so there is no need for statutory compulsion. However, the sites we are talking about, which offer material defined as pornographic, are quite different, because they provide a product that it is generally entirely legal for adults to access, and in many cases entirely reasonable, as there is no sense in which this is a kind of anti-pornography crusade. In that context, it is completely unsurprising that the ISPs made it clear they would not block pornographic sites without statutorily defined age-verification checks. Indeed, in evidence given on 25 October to the Communications Committee in the other place, the director of policy at Sky said of IP blocking under part 3 of the Bill:

“If there is a desire for ISPs to be blocking access to those sites, then legislation is required…If you want ISPs to block, I think they will struggle to do so, unless they are compelled to, and not because they do not want to but because they would probably be breaking the law.”

Indeed, Ofcom gave the Committee a similar message a week later, saying:

“If ISPs were to take any action blocking non-compliant sites, they would do so on a voluntary basis…I think you…have heard from ISPs about the legal difficulties they…would face if they were to undertake voluntary blocking…it would raise issues in relation to net neutrality.”

The second point, which has been widely raised among colleagues, is that there is overwhelming support among the majority of the British public for introducing these age-verification measures robustly. Eight out of 10 people absolutely support this very good manifesto commitment and want it to work. Indeed, the BBFC, which the Minister has chosen to be the regulator—I think all of us absolutely support it as a trusted brand in the space; it is not me or anyone else deciding what is over-18 material, because that will be based on the BBFC’s tried and tested guidelines—said itself that it felt that the regulator needed this power if it was effectively to carry out its work.

Photo of Maria Miller Maria Miller Chair, Women and Equalities Committee, Chair, Women and Equalities Committee

My hon. Friend says that this power is consistent with the guidelines that the regulator uses already, but my point was that it is not. Its powers are far more broadly drawn with regards to adult material over and above simply pornography.

Photo of Claire Perry Claire Perry Conservative, Devizes

I do have great sympathy with the provisions my right hon. Friend has tabled; she is absolutely right to keep pushing on the issue. We defined the manifesto commitment and the Bill very tightly in terms of the online pornography space, and I wanted to achieve that first before we moved to broader definitions which, as she will be aware, quickly throw up many more questions about the scope of regulation. As she and I both know, there is a great desire in this space to make the perfect the enemy of the good, and with almost every advance we have made, we have been told, “Back off,” because something is not absolutely perfect. She, I and many other Members think that this is a process of iterative steps forward, and the Government are doing a great job in that respect.

The final argument for putting such blocking on a statutory basis is the precedent for IP blocking in the case of copyright infringement under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. It would seem perverse for the House to argue that it was legal to instruct people to block sites that infringe copyright, but not those that infringe a legal requirement for age verification. It would be quite wrong for us to suggest that child protection is less important than protecting the interests of often very large commercial businesses.

I have two other quick points to make about why the case for change is so compelling. The first is that the BBFC has said that it will focus primarily on offshore sites, which are the main source of much of this material. Of course, as we know, it will be very difficult to enforce fines outside the UK jurisdiction. Secondly, we know that many sites are not reliant purely on financial transactions coming through the sorts of sites discussed in the Bill, given that there are systems such as Bitcoin and other forms of revenue generation.

I am absolutely delighted that the Government have tabled new proposals. I will not press my new clause and I will support their measures wholeheartedly. However, I want to probe the Minister—perhaps he will answer this question in a moment—about who will actually enforce the Bill. My understanding is that the BBFC does not currently have the enforcement powers required by new clause 28, which was why many of us assumed that Ofcom would be the enforcer of choice, as was set out very explicitly by my neighbour, my hon. Friend Kit Malthouse. We would therefore be keen to hear who will actually enforce the Bill, because we know that, without robust enforcement, there will be little incentive for websites to implement age verification, despite these new powers, and I think almost the whole House will support me in saying that we want this to be a great success.

I finish by sincerely thanking those who have campaigned so tirelessly on this issue in this House and, indeed, in the other place. They include my hon. Friends the Members for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes) and for Congleton (Fiona Bruce), Helen Goodman, who was so instrumental when we first had the review, Fiona Mactaggart, who is no longer in the Chamber, as well as several new Members, including Calum Kerr—I should call him the hon. Gentleman who represents the borders, because his constituency is far too long to spell out—and my hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire.

Photo of Calum Kerr Calum Kerr Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Environment and Rural Affairs), Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Digital) 6:15, 28 November 2016

I stand to speak to new clauses 22 and 27, neither of which I think the Minister referred to—unless I slept through that bit. I hang on his every word normally, so I am sure that was not the case.

Before I do that, I would like to touch on a couple of other new clauses. It is a pleasure to follow Claire Perry. She and her many colleagues in the House have campaigned hard on this issue, and the Government’s move in new clause 28 is welcome. However, I would just quickly recount a story. When I was on the Bill Committee, I phoned home one night. Of course my wife said, “What have you been up to today?” I explained about access to under-age pornography, and she said, “Well, funnily enough, I came home today from work and found Robert”—he is seven years old—“looking at inappropriate content.” My heart sank. She said, “He was watching the third presidential debate,” and I can see where she was coming from. She said to him, “Robert, do you know what you are watching here?” He said, “Yes, I do.” She said, “Well, why are you watching that?” He said, “Because it’s important, and I have a friend at school called Donald.”

That brings me on to the concerns raised by Kevin Brennan, which we share. As we proceed down this route, it is important that these powers are a last resort, that they do not stop access to sites they were not intended to affect and that, as a result, we proceed with care. We should take sufficient time to look at the implications, and we should seek to avoid unintended consequences for ISPs and websites, while still developing a robust set of measures that stop young Robert accessing the content we really want him to avoid.

Earlier, we had mention of the importance of the method of verification and of the tool Yoti. I always pronounce it “yachty”, because I like yachty a loty, given that it means that databases are not built of what people are accessing, and individuals are protected. I commend those on the Labour Front Bench for some of their efforts to push these things further.

Let me quickly touch on two issues before going on to my own new clauses. On new clause 7, I am surprised by the Minister’s approach to mobile phone contracts. If he consulted Ofcom, it would tell him that it was highly supportive of measures such as a maximum bill level. It seems eminently sensible that when people sign up for a contract, they are asked, “Would you like to set a maximum amount?” I really cannot fathom why the Government would block that. I fully expect to revisit that sometime soon.

I would also ask the Minister to check some of the wording in terms of the ESN sites, which he said would be available to all providers. That is not my understanding. The ESN is provided by EE, but also by extended area network sites, and those are the sites that will be multi-platform, but they are only part of how the service will be provided, so perhaps the Minister will revisit and consider what he said there.

My hon. Friend Drew Hendry, whose constituency name is as long as mine, is worried he may not get to speak, so I will mention his new clause 20, which is very similar to new clause 25, and provides for a constituent to cancel a contract if they do not have service.

Photo of Drew Hendry Drew Hendry Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Transport)

In some circumstances, a consumer is unable to get what they have paid for. For example, I had consumers in Fort Augustus who had to wait over four months to be reconnected to their mobile signal and were threatened with a £200 cancellation fee. Does my hon. Friend agree that that is flatly unacceptable and they should have an option to get out of these contracts?

Photo of Calum Kerr Calum Kerr Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Environment and Rural Affairs), Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Digital)

I wholeheartedly agree with that excellent point. This is another common-sense measure that should be taken. I also welcome some of the other comments about linking it to auto-compensation so that it should be a case of either cancelling a contract or potentially—

Photo of Drew Hendry Drew Hendry Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Transport)

I wonder whether my hon. Friend is surprised, as I am, although perhaps I should not be, that the Minister has refused to accept this, given that last year his predecessor said to me:

“The suggestion you make—that mobile customers ought to be able to leave their contracts if the service is unacceptable is a good one. Mobile customers should not be trapped in contracts if they have no effective signal and an unusable service.”

Photo of Calum Kerr Calum Kerr Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Environment and Rural Affairs), Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Digital)

I thank my hon. Friend for that extra clarification. This is why we entered the Bill Committee in a spirit of naive optimism that our sensible new clauses could yet be accepted.

Photo of Calum Kerr Calum Kerr Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Environment and Rural Affairs), Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Digital)

How we learned, indeed.

I now move on to my two new clauses. New clause 22 proposes that there should be an explicit power for structural separation of BT Openreach were that deemed necessary. We in this place know how critically important connectivity is, and I am sure that all right hon. and hon. Members welcomed, as I did, Ofcom’s digital communications review. I support its taking a fairly strong line on the measures that BT should take on access to ducts and poles, and on making a planning tool and other things more readily available, while retaining the option of structural separation. Indeed, the Secretary of State confirmed this on Second Reading. If structural separation is truly to be an option on the table, it is essential that Ofcom is confident that it can enforce it if it concludes that it is necessary.

The current situation is that Ofcom considers that it has the power under the EU framework directive to impose structural separation. Clearly, though, taking such a case to the EU Commission at a time when Brexit means Brexit is fraught with difficulty, especially considering that it is highly likely that BT would appeal any such move. It is also worth noting that BT has stated publicly that it believes there is no mechanism for structural separations of a telecoms company, and has even threatened 10 years of litigation and arguments. This Bill offers a simple way to remove any ambiguity around the issue, and that is what the new clause aims to do.

Unfortunately, owing to the processes of the House, I can press only one new clause in this group to a vote, so I will not press this one, much as I would like to. However, I encourage the Minister to revisit this measure and add it in, even though I still believe that the Ofcom strategy is right and that separation is the correct route only if combined with something else, such as a significant investment plan in Openreach from other providers who are currently making a lot of noise.

New clause 27 is about introducing a broadband voucher scheme as an alternative to the standard USO provision. Let me first say that I welcome, as I am sure we all do, anything that improves connectivity, but I have huge reservations about the approach being taken. I appreciate that, as the Government outlined in supplementary papers during the Bill’s progress, there is a flexible element to their design of the USO in terms of download speed, upload speed, latency and other aspects, but much is undecided. Although I disagree fundamentally with the 10-meg starting point, what really concerns me is the use of a universal service obligation. Pursuing this route pushes the Government into having to follow a very prescriptive process that will lead to a provider, or perhaps of couple of providers, being selected. It looks highly likely, as I think we all know, that it is likely to be BT. Sharon White confirmed before the DCMS Committee that BT is in pole position on this.

Photo of Drew Hendry Drew Hendry Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Transport)

My hon. Friend is making an excellent point. Does he agree that the people who need the service should be able to choose the best option for them, and that in rural areas one size does not fit all?

Photo of Calum Kerr Calum Kerr Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Environment and Rural Affairs), Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Digital)

I absolutely do agree. I will come on to that point later.

I would contrast the USO measure with last week’s announcements. We have heard the Government say that fibre is the future, but our record in this country on fibre-to-the-home, or fibre-to-the-premises, is pretty woeful. The broadband investment fund announced in a previous Budget had some money put into it, and hundreds of millions of pounds were committed to 5G trials and fibre backbone. All that is welcome, if slightly unambitious, but we have not seen anything specifically for rural areas. We are talking about a fibre and gigabit future in urban areas while telling rural areas that they should settle for 10 megs and a USO. That is not closing the digital divide—it is turning it into a gaping chasm of inequality. A badly implemented USO will not fix the issue but might, through legislation, cement this digital divide.

My new clause aims to address this issue. From the start, as I have looked at potential solutions, the one that I kept coming back to was a voucher alternative. At the Broadband World Forum, a representative from the Independent Networks Cooperative Association said that if we introduce a voucher scheme, we turn a universal service obligation into a universal service opportunity. In our constituencies we have highly motivated groups of people who will, yes, okay, maybe on day one, be happy with 10 megs because if they have been living with 1 meg it will be transformational, but quickly see that they are being left behind and be very unhappy about it. Although the Bill includes provision to revisit this, it does not specify when, and these people will be left further and further behind. The idea of a voucher scheme was endorsed by INCA chairman David Cullen, who said:

“The principle of a Universal Service Obligation is an outdated concept in a sector focused on significant growth and could well translate into a ‘ceiling’…a voucher scheme for premises could be far more effective.”

The Minister did not deal with this new clause in his opening remarks. I urge the Government to embrace the option of a voucher alternative to empower our rural communities, who, as I know from my own community, want to go further. They understand technology. They will put in fibre-to-the-home, providing a much faster solution. This is not a one-size-fits-all—

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

I did address this point. I said that the USO contained in the Bill will get high-speed broadband everywhere. Furthermore, a broadband voucher scheme does not require legislation. In fact, we have had one in the past without legislation. This new clause is therefore unnecessary.

Photo of Calum Kerr Calum Kerr Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Environment and Rural Affairs), Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Digital)

I thank the Minister for that intervention. He makes a point that I forgot to make, which is that there is previous history in this area. Broadband Delivery UK managed a voucher scheme that was phenomenally successful. Perhaps I have become a cynic far too quickly in this place, but if the Government do not put this in the Bill, I do not believe it will happen. I will therefore press the new clause to a vote. We should ensure that as the Government say that fibre—

Photo of Matthew Hancock Matthew Hancock Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (Digital Policy)

As an example of the fact that we can do this through non-legislative means, not only did we have such a scheme in the past, but at the autumn statement last week we announced that we are to consult on a new one. I think that that takes care of the concerns behind the new clause.

Photo of Calum Kerr Calum Kerr Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Environment and Rural Affairs), Shadow SNP Westminster Group Leader (Digital) 6:30, 28 November 2016

I thank the Minister for that positive news, but it does not take care of those concerns. I am seeking a specific alternative to the USO, so that my communities who want fibre to their home can have this foundational voucher that sets them on a path to something far more ambitious than what the Government propose. The Government say that fibre is the future. Guess what? My constituents want to be part of that future, too.

Several hon. Members:

rose—

Photo of Natascha Engel Natascha Engel Deputy Speaker (Second Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means)

Order. We have about 15 minutes and quite a few Members wish to speak, so brevity would be fantastic.

Photo of John Whittingdale John Whittingdale Conservative, Maldon

I start by making it clear that I fully support the provisions in the Bill to require age verification to access pornographic sites. As I observed on Second Reading, it is just as well, since my name is on the front of the Bill.

I would like to introduce an element of caution. Unlike a lot of other material online that has been discussed—child pornography, racist material, hate speech, extremist encouragement and copyright breaches—we are talking here about legal content. Like it or not, the sites we are discussing are visited by millions and millions of people every day. They are some of the most popular sites on the entire internet.

As I have said, I support the idea of age verification to ensure that only those who can appropriately view this material do so, although there are concerns. I have yet to see exactly how age verification is going to work. We have seen examples of existing content access control systems through things such as credit cards, or mobile phones that have been verified as belonging to an adult. It is, in my view, asking a lot to ask people who want to access legal content to hand over their credit card numbers to pornographic website operators. Mr Carmichael was absolutely right to flag up the data protection concerns about that. I hope that Ofcom will look very carefully at how the CAC systems work.

As I mentioned earlier, one of the main ways in which young people are now exposed to pornography is through social media such as Twitter, and I do not really see that the Bill will do anything to stop that happening. That is not to say that we should not take action against pornographic sites. The original Bill contained a number of quite significant enforcement measures, such as requiring payment providers, website hosting companies and advertisers to stop dealing with websites that had been identified as not complying with the law under the Bill. There are already signs that a number of the big providers are going to comply. MindGeek, which is probably the biggest operator, has said that it will introduce age verification systems, although it wanted others to do so as well. I hope that it will happen.

Photo of John Whittingdale John Whittingdale Conservative, Maldon

If my hon. Friend will forgive me, I am very conscious of the Deputy Speaker’s strictures.

I was not persuaded of the necessity of introducing ISP blocking. It represents a considerable infringement of the civil liberties of individuals who want to access material that, as everybody has recognised in this debate, they are perfectly entitled to access. At a time when we are very concerned about the growth of censorship online, and when certain countries would like to take this as a precedent for saying, “It is fine to block content that we do not particularly like,” I think that it is a dangerous road to go down. I hope that the measures originally in the Bill will prove sufficient, that operators will introduce age verification and that we will pause before taking the next step and introducing ISP blocking. To that extent, I rather hope that this Digital Economy Bill is like the Digital Economy Bill that we debated in 2010. That Bill provided for the Government to intervene and require ISP blocking, but the measure was never introduced.

Photo of Helen Goodman Helen Goodman Labour, Bishop Auckland

I am pleased to take part in this debate, and I was pleased to put my name to new clause 1. I am extremely pleased to follow Mr Whittingdale, and I am glad to see the new regime on the Government Front Bench, who have basically accepted new clause 1. The right hon. Gentleman’s argument that because something is legal and enjoyed by grown-ups, we should not have restrictions for children, is patently absurd.

Photo of John Whittingdale John Whittingdale Conservative, Maldon

I support age verification completely. I have said that I support age verification.

Photo of Helen Goodman Helen Goodman Labour, Bishop Auckland

The right hon. Gentleman said that, but he also said that he thought that this was a difficult area, and one of the reasons why he thought so was that people enjoyed doing it. Grown-ups enjoy having sex and grown-ups enjoy drinking alcohol, but that does not mean that those things are okay for children.

My real purpose this evening is to speak to new clause 26, which I had considerable help from the National Deaf Children’s Society in preparing. The new clause is designed to protect from frequency interference those with hearing loss who have hearing aids, radio aids, cochlear implants and other hearing technologies. Ofcom is about to sell spectrum, and there is a concern that the part of the spectrum that it is going to sell is so close to the wavelength used by such technologies that interference will be caused.

The new clause would place a duty on Ofcom to carry out tests in advance of the sale of the radio frequencies to ensure that any interference is identified and made public and to take appropriate action. That action could take two forms: either Ofcom should not grant a wireless telegraphy licence unless action is taken to remove the risk of interference; or a fund should be established to cover the cost of replacing medical and hearing technology affected by interference. That is important for the 10 million people who suffer from hearing loss and the 45,000 deaf children in this country, and it will enable Ofcom to fulfil its duties under the Equality Act 2010.

The Minister has said that tests have been done and more tests will be done and that we will know what those tests come up with in April 2017, so everything is fine. That is not the view of the National Deaf Children’s Society, which is not confident about the way in which the tests will be carried out. It has undertaken considerable correspondence with the regulator, and there is still dispute about how the tests should be done and how the results should be interpreted. Even if the tests are done and the results published on this occasion, as the Minister suggested, what happens then? What if there is interference? Will the spectrum then not be auctioned off as the Government intend? Will there be some funding for people who have to have new hearing aids as a result? The Minister’s response, I am sorry to say, is not adequate.

Interference will be a problem for children who use radio aids in the classroom to help them to hear what their teachers are saying. Unlike grown-ups, they cannot easily guess what a person is saying, because they are hearing things for the first time. The tests done in 2014 found that someone with a mobile phone using the relevant frequency could interfere with a hearing aid 4 metres away. I know quite a lot about hearing aids, because my husband has terrible hearing and he has two hearing aids. If he goes to a party, he can hardly hear what other people are saying anyway, and if his hearing aids were interfered with by other people standing in the room, it would be a nightmare. I urge the Minister to be flexible and to look at the matter again.

Photo of Grant Shapps Grant Shapps Conservative, Welwyn Hatfield

I rise to support my new clause 25, on the ability of end-users to cancel mobile contracts. It is very similar to new clauses tabled by other hon. Members—indeed, on the last count, by hon. Members from four different parties. I am grateful to the Minister for saying that this will now be considered in the Green Paper that the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy will bring out next year. However, I want to point out that the idea that a 14-day cooling-off period after purchasing a phone is somehow sufficient for a contract lasting for two years is, frankly, completely inadequate. Some 60% of people now have contracts for two years, and there has been a 19% increase in the number of people with lengthy contracts during the past five or six years.

It in no way negates the problem to say that, if someone realises during the first 14 days they cannot get a signal, they can exchange their contract. What happens if they move or if their place of work moves and they are stuck with such a contract? This problem can actually be solved quite easily. All we need to do is to split out the cost of the device—on average, about £800—from the cost of the mobile contract for the phone and data elements. If we did that, the person could stay within the contract to buy the device, while being able to move to another operator that can provide a contract with the ability to access a signal for phone and data use.

My point is very simple. I think that the briefing on this is extremely misleading. I do not believe that Ofcom is likely to do anything about this in the next year or two. I thank the Minister for his advice that this will be considered in the Green Paper next year, because unless we get a bit more radical, people will be forced to pay hundreds of pounds for a service they quite simply never receive.

Photo of Hywel Williams Hywel Williams Shadow PC Spokesperson (Work and Pensions), Shadow PC Spokesperson (Culture, Media and Sport), Shadow PC Spokesperson (Foreign and Commonwealth Office/Europe), Plaid Cymru Westminster Leader, Shadow PC Spokesperson (Defence), Shadow PC Spokesperson (International Development)

I would have liked to speak to new clauses 3, 14 and 21, but I will restrict myself to new clause 13. New clause 13 would introduce a statutory code of practice to improve the performance of social media platforms when dealing with incidents of online abuse that cross the criminal threshold. It would place an obligation on the Minister to issue a code of practice, which would cover the processes and quality of the services provided. Such matters are commonplace in complaints procedures that already exist throughout the public utilities sector.

The code of practice would also cover an industry-specific requirement to set and enforce appropriate privacy settings for minors. This would be drafted after consultation with the industry, the criminal justice system, charities and other key stakeholders. An extensive consultation with a number of a significant bodies would guarantee a comprehensive set of guidelines.

Technology is ever adapting, which is why subsection (4) of new clause 13 states:

“The relevant Minister may from time to time revise and re-issue the code of practice.”

As technology is ever adapting, it is right and proper that legislation protecting vulnerable people from predatory and unacceptable behaviour online should be updated to reflect the dynamic nature of the online world. The new clause would have allowed that. I would have talked about this matter extensively had there been the time, but I hope that the points I would have made will be taken up in another place.

Photo of Fiona Bruce Fiona Bruce Chair, International Development Sub-Committee on the Work of the Independent Commission for Aid Impact, Chair, International Development Sub-Committee on the Work of the Independent Commission for Aid Impact

I am pleased to say that I will not press my amendment 2, but that I will support new clause 29. The new clause addresses the loophole that my amendment sought to address, and about which I spoke on Second Reading. I thank the Minister for listening and for acting by tabling the new clause.

The loophole is that, as established under the Communications Act 2003, the current law covering pornographic content online in the form of video on-demand only requires age verification for R18, not 18-rated, material when streamed from sites based within the UK. Without the new clause, the Bill would only deal with the provision of age verification for 18 and R18 video on-demand pornography streamed into this country from abroad.

New clause 29 will deal with the issue. The House has determined that it is not appropriate for under-18s to purchase videos that are 18-rated from a shop, and rightly so, so where the technology is available to apply similar protections online, it would be quite wrong not to use it. I am grateful to the Minister for tabling the new clause. Public opinion is very much with us on this issue. ComRes polling of 2,000 adults in Great Britain in July last year showed that 73% of people support age verification of any 18-rated DVDs shown online and that just 13% disagreed.

Photo of Alistair Carmichael Alistair Carmichael Liberal Democrat Spokesperson (Home Affairs)

I rise to echo some of the concerns that have already been expressed by Mr Whittingdale about new clause 28. I should say at the outset that, as the parent of two teenagers, I completely understand the motivation of those who have raised these concerns with the Government. I commend them for the way in which they have done so, and, indeed, I commend the Government for responding in the way they have. However, I fear that this is another occasion on which the Government are responding because, as we say, something must be done. I fear that we are in fact going down a road that will leave us exposed to the law of unintended consequences.

My primary concern is that, ultimately, the proposed provisions will not be that effective. They are capable of being circumvented pretty easily by any tech savvy 14-year-old. Therefore, where do we strike the balance between the protection offered against the risks that come with it? One of the risks we have not touched on is that of complacency. Seeing such changes being made, parents will think that this problem has been solved and has gone away and that they no longer need to be vigilant in the way they may have been hitherto.

My real concerns centre on the holding of the data. As I put it to the Minister when he was at the Dispatch Box, there are no provisions in the Bill to secure the privacy and anonymity of those using these sites. He said that the data will be held in accordance with the Data Protection Act, but as we saw in the Ashley Madison leaks, that was of no great assistance. Let us not forget just exactly what is at stake: as a consequence of that hack and of the information being put into the public domain, a number of people committed suicide. We seem to be treating the symptom rather than the disease, and what would really make the significant changes we all want is better sex and relationships education.

Photo of Natascha Engel Natascha Engel Deputy Speaker (Second Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means)

Unfortunately, the hon. Gentleman will not get his one minute of speaking time.

Two hours having elapsed since the commencement of proceedings on the programme motion, the debate was interrupted (Programme Order, this day).

The Deputy Speaker put forthwith the Question already proposed from the Chair (Standing Order No. 83E), That the clause be read a Second time.

Question agreed to.

New clause 28 accordingly read a Second time, and added to the Bill.

The Deputy Speaker then put forthwith the Questions necessary for the disposal of the business to be concluded at that time (Standing Order No. 83E).

New Clause 29