Dame Chi Onwurah

Dame Chi Onwurah

Labour — Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West

Speaking in the House of Commons on 17 July 2025

Debate

Social Media: Misinformation and Algorithms

Contribution

I thank the hon. Gentleman, my fellow Committee member, for that question, as well as for his contribution to this report and the work of the Committee, which has been exceedingly valuable. He has raised a really important point; we heard evidence from Meta about Facebook content checking, and how outside the UK and the US it was moving from fact-checking to community notes, which X has also done. The Committee has recommended adopting the principle that platforms are held accountable, which must go hand in hand with those platforms setting out how they can demonstrate that accountability. The report also recommends that the Government undertake research into what effective fact-checking looks like and how misinformation is spread, because one of the things that the Committee—which is a scientific Committee—observed was the lack of real evidence in thar area. That is partly because the algorithms and platforms are so opaque and secretive about how they operate.

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