Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)

My Lords, I am very grateful to the Minister for introducing the regulations and to the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, for tabling his amendment and for moving it in the way that he did, because it has given us the opportunity to have this very important debate on this landmark Act of Parliament. My noble friend Lady Morgan of Cotes was right to begin her remarks by reminding your Lordships that the passage of that Act was a shining example of this House doing its job very well indeed, giving careful, considered and non-partisan scrutiny to legislation before us. The noble Lord, Lord Stevenson of Balmacara, rightly recalls the cross-party spirit that he did so much to foster from Second Reading, and it was a pleasure working with noble Lords from across the House in that spirit to make sure that the Act found its way to the statute book in the improved way that it did. We are here tonight because of a number of amendments made to the Bill as it went through this House. The Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee of your Lordships’ House recommended in its report on the Bill that the first regulation for the category 1 thresholds should be subject to the affirmative procedure. I was glad to accept that recommendation when I was the Minister taking the Bill through, and I am glad to be here for the debate on it, albeit speaking from a different Dispatch Box. The noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, does indeed embarrass me by citing the Parkinson rule. I said at the time that Cyril Northcote Parkinson has the better reputation for Parkinson’s laws. But that undertaking was an important one that I was happy to make to ensure that Parliament had the ongoing scrutiny. We all recognised as we passed this law that this was a fast-moving area of technology, that legislatures across the world were struggling to keep up, and that it would be important for the post-legislative scrutiny to take place in the same agile and consensual way in which we sought to pass the Act. We are also here because of an amendment made to the Bill on Report by my noble friend Lady Morgan. Both she and the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, were too gracious to recall that it took me a little longer to get there. That amendment was made despite my arguments to the contrary. My noble friend pressed her amendment, defeated me and the previous Government and changed the Bill. When the Bill was in another place, the Government accepted her point. I was helped along the way in that legislative journey by clear exhortations from noble Lords on the Labour Front Bench who were then in opposition. In our debate on my noble friend Lady Morgan’s amendment on 19 July 2023, the noble Lord, Lord Knight of Weymouth, who I am glad to see in his place, albeit now on the Back Benches, said that my noble friend’s amendment was a “no-brainer”. He pointed out that the Bill, as it stood, “requires Ofcom to … be mindful of size”, but argued that: “We need to be more nuanced”.—[Official Report, 19/7/23; col. 2344.] and that it was right to give Ofcom leeway or flexibility in the categorisation and to bring providers into the safety regime. Those points were echoed in another place by Alex Davies-Jones, the Member of Parliament for Pontypridd, who is now a Minister at the Ministry of Justice with responsibility for tackling violence against women and girls, rape and serious sexual offences, child sexual abuse and many other very serious matters. In opposition, following that debate, she made the point that: “Categorisation of services based on size rather than risk of harm will mean that the Bill will fail to address some of the most extreme harms on the internet”.—[Official Report, Commons, 12/7/22; col. 168.] I wonder what Ms Davies-Jones says now that she is at the Ministry of Justice. I am very grateful to Ofcom. I had a helpful phone call last week with Robert Brown and Mark Bunting of Ofcom to understand its approach. My criticisms are directed at the Government, not at Ofcom. Without wanting to rehearse my old job, I will help the Minister by pointing out that many of the concerns raised are covered by the Bill. The Bill is very clear that the duties to act on illegal content and to protect children apply to services of every size. Some of the points made, including the very moving and harrowing examples given by the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, may well be covered by the illegal duties and the protection of children duties, and the Minister was right to point that out. But there is a shift in approach from the commitments I made at the Dispatch Box when I was a Minister and the decision that Parliament took in backing my noble friend Lady Morgan’s amendment. I am interested in why the Government have changed their mind, particularly having been so strongly in favour of making those changes to the Bill when in opposition. In her opening remarks, the Minister used the ubiquitous phrase “unintended consequences”. She mentioned that the Government did not want unintentionally to categorise hundreds of small and non-risky services, but would that necessarily be the case? Surely a granular case-by-case categorisation would not bring in so many hundreds. It seems that she and the Government are leaning rather heavily on other parts of the Act that talk about the quick, easy and wide dissemination of material online. I wonder whether the “and wide” part of that is doing a lot of heavy lifting here. Is that what is making the Government make the connection to the size? Is the width of dissemination driving the policy decision here? And it is a policy decision. The Government are not bound to follow the advice that Ofcom has provided; they can disagree with it. In the debate in another place on these regulations, my right honourable friend Sir Jeremy Wright, a former law officer, said it would not be right to ask the Government to provide the legal advice they have had on these matters, but like the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, I would be very interested in seeing that. I wonder whether the Minister is able to say a bit more about the legal basis on which they have decided that they are unable to disagree, or are not inclined to disagree, with Ofcom on this. I hope she will be able to give a very clear answer to the very clear question posed by my noble friend Lady Penn, who put very well the question about legal advice and the Government’s room for manoeuvre here.