Southport MP Patrick Hurtley has backed the Prime Minister’s announcement that children under-16 will be banned from using social media.
Keir Starmer said today that children will be banned from social media by Spring 2027.
Starmer says social media is making children unhappy, making it easier for bullies to abuse children, and is “designed to be addictive”. A ban would give children more time, security, and more freedom to grow up – as well as more opportunities, he adds.
Southport MP Patrick Hurley today told Stand Up For Southport that “I’m fully in favour of children being protected from online harms and I welcome the Government’s proposals to better protect children online.
“For too long, we have treated social media as though it is simply a neutral technology, when in reality many platforms are deliberately designed to maximise attention, encourage compulsive use and expose young people to content and interactions that most parents would find deeply worrying.
“We would not allow children unrestricted access to other environments that we know can shape behaviour in harmful ways, and the online world should be no different.
“This is not about being anti-technology or anti-innovation. Digital tools can be enormously positive. But there is a growing body of evidence, and indeed the lived experience of many families, that the current status quo is not working for children.
“Parents have been asking for help, and the government has a responsibility to respond.
“Of course, no single policy will solve this on its own. Alongside sensible safeguards online, we also need to rebuild the real-world opportunities that help young people thrive – youth clubs, sports, music, volunteering, places to belong and people to look up to. But these proposals are an important and overdue step in the right direction.”
Earlier this year Patrick Hurley said: “There is no real argument any more about whether social media affects children’s wellbeing. We can all see that it does. The question is what we do next.
“For me, this is not an abstract issue. My wife is a teacher, and she sees every day how the online world follows children into school. She sees the anxiety that comes from constant comparison, the distraction of phones, and the way problems that start online quickly end up in the classroom. Teachers are being asked to deal with issues that simply did not exist a generation ago. They are ill-equipped to deal with them, but so is society more generally.
“This is not about being anti-technology. Used properly, the internet can help young people learn and stay in touch with friends. But we should also be honest about the fact that today’s social media platforms were not built with children in mind. These platforms are built around algorithms, endless feeds and notifications that are meant to keep users engaged. Expecting children to manage that environment on their own, often late at night, is unrealistic, especially when many adults struggle with it too. They want to get us addicted to the next dopamine hit of notifications or endless scrolling. I can just about cope with that as a bloke pushing 50, but a kid of 14 just isn’t remotely able to.
“That is why I support the government’s decision to consult on further steps to protect children online, including whether access to social media should be restricted for under-16s.
“In my Southport constituency, we have seen how quickly social media can make a bad situation worse. After the tragic stabbings in July 2024, conspiracy theories and false claims spread rapidly online, so quickly in fact that by the time I’d arrived home from Westminster on the evening of the attack, there were already thousands of false reports from bad faith actors online designed to do nothing other than cause trouble and capitalise on tensions. Rumours about what had happened and who was responsible were shared widely, before the facts were known. That added to the fear and distress felt across the community at a very difficult time.
“As later investigations showed, the attacker – who was himself just 17 – had watched a violent video on social media showing the stabbing of a bishop in Sydney, just minutes before he left his home. That video was allowed to remain on the platform. Social media did not cause these crimes, but the way harmful and misleading content spreads can clearly make things worse.
Young people in our area were exposed to graphic material and speculation in real time, before there was any official information. That is not a safe or healthy situation.
“The government has already taken action through the Online Safety Act, which requires platforms to remove illegal content and introduce age checks. This is an important step, but it should not be the end of the discussion. Many parents feel stuck. They worry about the effect social media is having on their children, but they also worry about their child being left out if they are not online. Clearer rules could help take some of that pressure off families.
“Some people will say that a minimum age is too blunt a tool. That is a fair point to raise, and it is why we are consulting. But doing nothing is also a choice, and it leaves children exposed to systems we already know can cause harm. Other countries, including Australia, have moved to set a minimum age for social media and to place responsibility on the platforms rather than on parents alone. We should look carefully at what we can learn from that.
“At the heart of this is a simple issue: whether we are prepared to change the current system in order to better protect young people. This government believes that children’s wellbeing should come first. We will be guided by the evidence and by the experiences of families and schools.
“Our children should be able to grow up without constant pressure from online platforms that were never designed with them in mind. Getting this right is not easy, but it is necessary.”
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