Matters of Urgency — Cybersafety

Andrew McLachlan

I inform the Senate that the President has received the following letter, dated 18 November, from Senator Roberts:

Pursuant to standing order 75, I give notice that today I propose to move "That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency:

The need to recognise that a blanket ban on social media for children under 16 expropriates parental power, and for the Senate to affirm that parental responsibility rests in the parents, not the Federal Government."

Is the proposal supported?

More than the number of senators required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

With the concurrence of the Senate, the clerks will set the clock in line with the informal arrangements made by the whips.

Malcolm Roberts

I move:

That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency:

The need to recognise that a blanket ban on social media for children under 16 expropriates parental power, and for the Senate to affirm that parental responsibility rests in the parents, not the Federal Government. The government is proposing a ban on children under 16 accessing social media and justifies the measure because it's supposedly popular. Oh, really? It's ironic that the same parties who accuse One Nation of populism are now promoting a measure not because it's workable but, rather, because it's supposedly popular.

A true conservative, though, would support parents supervising their own children in their own home. That's not what Mr Peter Dutton is doing. A true conservative opposition leader would not be promoting big government replacing parents. Instead, he would be making device supervision easier for parents.

The government repeatedly is giving more power to social media giants under the guise, they say, of transparency. They're not revealing anything. We still don't see the algorithms of the social media giants—international players who have control over our space. What we're doing is not making device supervision easier for parents. We're not making it easier for parents to fulfil their responsibilities as parents. It's time that social media companies—plus Apple, Microsoft and Android—made their parental locks easier and more powerful. So let's start there.

No country in the world has made age limits work, because bureaucrats or social media platforms in far-off countries can't see who's using the computer or phone. The only people who can see what the child is doing with their device are the people in their home with them—the parents. It's a parental duty, a parental responsibility and a parental right to raise their children and to supervise their children. If this proposal from the government goes through, parents allowing their children to watch cartoons and educational shows on free-to-view social media, including YouTube, would be breaking the law. Parents supervising their children would be breaking the law. Watching the same material on Foxtel at $99 a month would be legal. Does that seem right? To me it doesn't.

Essential and YouGov polling showed a majority of Australians support higher age restrictions on social media. This is the same Essential poll which found 17-year-olds should be able to buy alcohol and watch pornography and also recommended the age for criminal responsibility be raised to 14. Who did they ask? Are these next in the uniparty's embrace of populism? My speech earlier today gave information on the unintended consequences of this idea. I will post the speeches together on my website. This problem is as old as the internet, and it's not going anywhere. Let parents parent. That's fundamental to raising children.

We're seeing the opportunity in education now. States and the federal education department, which doesn't have a single school, allow indoctrination programs through the national curriculum. Instead of being education, it's now indoctrination. They're grooming young children for the globalist agenda. They terrorise children: 'The climate is changing. The globe is boiling. The world will end. You've only got five years to live unless we do something.' These are the terrorists for young children today—the globalists who are pushing this agenda and this legislation around the world.

One Nation supports this matter being referred to a Senate inquiry, where technology experts can testify on the harms and unintended consequences of replacing parental supervision with government overreach and government control. We need to let parents parent. Instead of giving more power to the globalist corporations and to the internet behemoths, we need to put the power back with parents and let parents look after their children. As I said before, it is a parental duty, a parental responsibility and a parental right. I am sick and tired, and so are so many parents and grandparents across this country, of the government trying to be a nanny state to protect their kids all while grooming their children for control, whether directly through education or indirectly through social media. What we need to do is actually look at what people need and then act accordingly. One Nation is not in favour of this. We are surprised that the Liberal Party, including their leader, seem to be lining up in support of censoring teens on the internet.

Marielle Smith

As a parent and as a legislator, I see absolutely nothing wrong with government working in partnership with parents, with families and with the community to keep children safe. Actually, I think it's a fundamental responsibility of government to do everything we can and to pull every lever we can to keep children safe. We know at the moment, when it comes to their online engagement, that children are not safe online, whether that's in terms of the things they're exposed to or in terms of the way certain things are marketed to them, whether that goes to bullying online or to the prolificness of eating disorders and other mental health challenges. We know that our children are not safe online. There is no issue raised more with me by parents in my community than this one. Parents are desperate to keep their children safe, but they feel like this has become too big for them to manage in their homes, and they want the backing and support of the federal government. They want us to do something about this.

We have an opportunity and a chance as a government to say, 'Yes, we see these harms exist; yes, we know these things are hurting our children; yes, we see this is increasing bullying; yes, we see this is increasing eating disorders; and yes, we see that this is causing so much damage to our youngest minds, and we can do something about it.' I think that is a good thing for federal governments to do. In so many other areas of children's safety and supporting children, we expect government, whether it be our state governments or our federal governments, to work in partnership with parents and to work in partnership with families to keep children safe. We cannot be any clearer that, at the moment, they are not safe online. I think this is fundamentally the right thing to do. Parents tell me that they want us to do it—that they want us to reinforce the decisions they are taking in their own homes. They are doing everything they feel they can do to keep their children safe online.

Recent research tells us that the majority of young parents are concerned about the impact of social media on their child's mental health and wellbeing and that 85 per cent of parents have had conflicts with their children over their use of social media. While this is incredibly stressful and concerning for parents, the most severe impacts are on children. We know that one in five young women have had a sexual image of themselves shared without their permission. A recent Australian study has found that the average age of a child's first exposure to pornography is 13.2 for boys and 14.1 for girls.

When I was part of the select committee into social media, I heard about the harmful content that kids are being exposed to online, and eSafeKids told us this content was mainstream, with 62 per cent of young people aged 14 to 17 in Australia exposed to harmful content online. The eSafety Commissioner made clear to us that bullying is a significant concern for younger generations and that much of this happens online. According to the Butterfly Foundation, of the 95 per cent of young people who reported some level of concern about their body image, 62 per cent felt dissatisfied due to social media, and nearly half said body dissatisfaction prevented them from attending school.

We know that children are hurting. We know that this is not good for our kids. We know overwhelmingly—I know overwhelmingly—that parents want us to do something about it. Of course, the ultimate responsibility for our children's safety lies with parents. Every one of us who is a parent knows that. As a parent, it is all you think about all day and all night: How can I keep my children safe? Is there something I'm missing? Is there something I'm failing to do which means my kids are at risk and my kids are going to be exposed to harm? You start feeling that from the moment you're pregnant, and it never leaves you.

We know at the moment parents are worried. We know they feel there is something which is not within their power to control which presents an unacceptable risk of harm to their children. But it is in our control in this chamber. It is in our control to regulate this, to stand with families, to stand with parents and, ultimately, to stand with the young people who are most at risk of harm here. We do it in so many other areas of children's safety. State governments do it. Federal governments do it. This is a new frontier and a new thing for us to navigate, but it is the right thing to do. We have an opportunity to keep our children safer and to stand with parents in that effort, which can feel colossal at times. That's not taking away parental responsibility; that's reinforcing it.

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