Lewis Atkinson

Lewis Atkinson

Labour — Sunderland Central

Speaking in the House of Commons on 15 December 2025

Debate

Online Safety Act 2023: Repeal

Contribution

My hon. Friend makes that point well, and the Minister will have heard it. As this discussion continues, I hope that we can find a way of reflecting these two areas of balance—these two features of the online world now. First, there is the absolute primacy of safeguarding children and tackling serious online harms, but it is also important to recognise the real benefits that living in an increasingly connected society bring us all. I think those are very much the motivations of the petition’s creator—we are talking about the work done by good, civic-minded folk, and creators and administrators of online communities and hobby forums across the country. Naturally, as our learning about the implementation of the Act continues, there is a way of doing that that supports the efforts of those people without risking such sites being used to further online harms. The consensus, I think it is fair to say, is that reform of the Act, rather than repeal, is the realistic route forward. That is natural with such groundbreaking legislation, but reform must be sensitive to the scale, proportionality and privacy, as well as the emerging and changing nature of online harms. I thank Members for their time and their interventions, and I look forward to a positive debate.

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