Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)

My Lords, I will speak briefly. I added my name in support of Amendments 197 and 198, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron. We do not need to rehearse the arguments as to why children are a distinct group who need to be looked at in a distinctive way, so I will not repeat those arguments. I turn to the excellent points made in the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Bethell. Data access for researchers is fundamental. The problem with statutory bodies, regulators and departments of state is that they are not designed and set up to be experts in researching some of the more arcane areas in which these algorithms are developed. This is leading-edge stuff. The employees in these platforms—the people who are designing and tweaking these very clever algorithms—are coming from precisely the academic and research institutions that are best placed to go into those companies and find out what they are doing. In many cases, it is their own graduates and PhDs who are doing it. They are the best qualified people to look at what is going on, because they will understand what is going on. If somebody tries to obfuscate, they will see through them immediately, because they can understand that highly sophisticated language. If we do not allow this, we will be in the deeply uncomfortable position of relying on brave people such as Frances Haugen to run the huge reputational, employability and financial risks of becoming a whistleblower. A whistleblower who takes on one of those huge platforms that has been employing them is a very brave person indeed. I would feel distinctly uncomfortable if I thought that we were trying to guard our citizens, and particularly our children, against what some of these algorithms are trying to do by relying on the good wishes and chances of a whistleblower showing us what was going on. I support all these amendments very strongly.