Sir Keir Starmer has suggested the Government will review social media laws in the wake of the riots.
As reported in The Telegraph, the Prime Minister said Labour will need to “look more broadly” at the sector after Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, said ministers should check whether existing legislation to protect against online harms is fit for purpose.
Speaking to broadcasters on a visit to Scotland Yard on Friday morning, Sir Keir was asked whether he agreed with his Labour colleague.
He replied: “I do agree that we’re going to have to look more broadly at social media after this disorder but the focus at the moment has to be on dealing with the disorder and making sure that our communities are safe and secure.”
It raises the prospect that Labour will revisit the Online Safety Act after Nick Thomas-Symonds, the Cabinet Office minister, said it would keep the legislative framework for the statute “under review”.
Sir Keir also warned social media is not a “law-free zone” as more sentences for online offences linked to the riots are expected to be passed in the coming hours.
Mr Thomas-Symonds told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “The Government’s strong message today is that we remain in a state of high readiness. We are vigilant going into the weekend.
“The Prime Minister chaired a Cobra meeting only yesterday, in which he set out that high state of readiness, so I think we’ll continue to see the criminal justice system acting and processing people very swiftly.”
Asked about Mr Khan’s comments that new social media rules were “not fit for purpose”, the minister said the Government would keep the legislative framework for the Online Safety Act “under review”.
He added: “If we need to act in relation to online safety laws – we will.
“Sadiq Khan’s challenge is that we quickly review it, consider it, and that’s exactly what we will do.”
On the Online Safety Act and misinformation on social media, he also told Sky News: “I think we will be looking at the legal framework that exists for regulating the platform providers.”
It’s currently unclear which section(s) of this already draconian legislation the Mayor of London and other senior figures in the Labour cabinet regard as in need of strengthening to better police people’s online speech and behaviour. Here are some of the ‘lowlights’ from Act which reached the statute books:
- Under Part 7 of the Online Safety Act 2023, existing terrorism, harassment and public order offences are termed “priority illegal content” and providers (including platforms which enable user-to-user interaction like Facebook, TikTok or X) have to prevent users from encountering it. The 2023 Act incentivises removal of this content by granting Ofcom the power to levy large fines if this content is not removed.
- Part 10 of the Act (in force as of 10th January 2024) creates new communications offences, including “false communications” (s.179) and “threatening communications” (s.181). For the purpose of these offences, it is important to note that a person can be liable even if they did not create the content of the message that they “send” (i.e., if they post, publish or transmit – including via oral communication like voice notes). A message can consist of, or include, a hyperlink to other content.
- A person commits a threatening communications offence if they send a message conveying a threat of serious harm (death, serious injury, rape, assault by penetration, or serious financial loss) and at the time of sending it intends that, or is reckless about, someone encountering the threat and fearing it will be carried out by the sender or someone else.
- There is a clear overlap between this offence and the offence of sending a “menacing” communication under s.127 of the Communications Act 2003. Unlike the s.127 offence, a conviction for the threatening communications offence under the 2023 Act allows for harsher sentences to be given out, i.e., imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years or a fine or both). This suggests that the threatening communications offence is designed to cover behaviour that is more serious than that covered by the s.127 offence.
- A person commits a false communications offence if they send a message conveying information that they know to be false, and at the time of sending the message they intend it to cause “non-trivial” psychological or physical harm to a “likely audience” (i.e., an individual who could reasonably be foreseen to encounter the message or its content) and they have no reasonable excuse for sending the message.
It’s now abundantly clear that following recent public disorder an anti-free speech ratchet effect is being set in motion, by Mayor Khan, Labour Cabinet ministers and many others of a similar political persuasion.
The crackdown, when it comes, won’t just target those directly participating in or inciting violence.
What will happen, just as it always happens, is that new or newly strengthened laws will be wielded against those who dissent from ‘progressive’ orthodoxy.
If you’re an FSU supporter, now might be a good time to become a member. Click the link below to join us and help support the work we do, standing up for the speech rights of our 14,000+ members in an increasingly censorious culture.
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