Lola McEvoy

Lola McEvoy

Labour — Darlington

Speaking in the House of Commons on 9 March 2026

Debate

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Contribution

I would like to talk to the social media element of the Lords amendments. The argument for stronger protections for children online has been won, not least because of the appalling harms that have come to so many children because of the lack of proper, functioning legislation. I will use my time, which is limited, on this subject to make clear what I would like the Government to do and why I will be voting down the amendments in front of us tonight. I want to focus on my steadfast belief that we must age-gate functionalities instead of age-gating social media, because I think that phrase will immediately become outdated—it is already outdated in schools. One of the big problems with the Online Safety Act and how long it took to come in is that so many technologies are now not covered by that legislation—it is not evergreen. I am determined to ensure that my time in this place is used to create evergreen legislation for the issue of our time, which is protecting children from the horrendous and exploitative harms that they are coming to.

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