Banning social media for under-16s is the right thing to do: Badenoch
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has given her support to Labour’s proposal to ban social media for under-16s in a rare show of cross-part agreement.
Writing in the Guardian, Badenoch said the Conservative party believes in freedom, but freedom is not given, and depends on the ability to make good choices in the first place. She added that ability is not fully formed in children.
“For too long, Britain has treated childhood as an afterthought. We know that a child’s early years shape the trajectory of their entire life. Yet our political system has too often focused more on repairing damage in adulthood rather than preventing it early on. That is a dereliction of our duty as politicians.
“Children’s brains are still developing. Their impulse control, emotional regulation and ability to assess risk are not the same as an adult’s. That is why we have age limits on alcohol, a legal age of consent and safeguarding requirements in schools. To most people this is common sense. And yet, in one crucial area, we have decided to suspend that logic entirely.”
Badenoch added that by restricting social media use for children, it would also give more freedoms to adults online.
“We will no longer need to contort digital spaces to be universally ‘child-friendly’, or impose blanket restrictions on speech and content because children might see it,” she said.
Badenoch’s comments come after the government announced a new consultation in a bid to reduce the harms of phones and social media on young people.
Immediate action will include Ofsted checking school mobile phone policy on every inspection, with schools expected to be phone-free by default thanks to today’s announcement.
The consultation will also look at other options, including raising the digital age of consent, implementing phone curfews to avoid excessive use, and restricting potentially addictive design features such as ‘streaks’ and ‘infinite scrolling’.
