Cecilia Robinson: Govt puts hold on social media ban for under 16s

A social media ban on children under the age of 16 is on hold.

Education Minister Erica Stanford says the Government is undertaking a wider programme of work on it.

LISTEN ABOVE

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
National Party has confirmed it is pausing its work on
a law to ban social media for under sixteen. Cecilia
Robinson is the co chair of the Child Online Safety
Advocacy Group Before sixteen and with us Cecilia, Hello, Hi
have that Why are they pausing this work? Is this
because they're planning to campaign on it?

Speaker 2 (00:18):
So can I just be really clear that that headline
is misleading. The work has not stopped, but what has
happened is that the individual Private member's bill has been
put on hold while the government is working for a
larger process which includes a bipartisan process alongside Labor. So
this is actually a positive news story today because what
we're seeing is the National and Labor are working together

(00:40):
to deliver on the commitment which they've been signaling for
the last six months. Okay, so we're actually really pleased
with this outcome, and it's it's clear that we've got
strong bipartisan momentum from this week in Parliament and so
it's been quite frustrating today to see the headlines which
are not consistent with actually what's happening behind the clock
quite clearly.

Speaker 1 (00:57):
Okay, so what is that you're on standing of the deadline?
With which they're working well.

Speaker 2 (01:03):
I think the public deadline has been that they're working
towards having something in place in advance of their election,
which has been incredibly clear and consistently signaled. But what
we have to understand is that the issue has moved
while passed where Catherine we had submitted her bill over
a year ago, and public understanding has shifted significantly, and
we're seeing at global movements now where you know, for example,

(01:25):
Meta has been being held to account in the US
for their conduct and actually this has become more complicated
which requires bipartisan support. So we're actually superfilled and really
comfortable about the fact that labor and nationalaw to really
see the issue here and actually working constructively together on
a solution.

Speaker 1 (01:45):
So how confident are you this thing gets passed before
the election.

Speaker 2 (01:49):
I've got a high degree of confidence that this will
pass before the election.

Speaker 1 (01:51):
Good stuff. You've filled me with some confidence there. Thank you,
Cecilia appreciated Cecilia Robinson before sixteen co chair.

Speaker 2 (01:58):
For more from Heather du Allen Drive, listen live to
News Talks a B from four pm weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio.