Coalition offers swift passage for Labor’s social media ban plan for children under 16

A ban on children using social media could become law before the end of November after Peter Dutton wrote to the Prime Minister offering to help the Government move swiftly to “protect Australian children”.

But researchers and the tech sector warn rushing the legislation means it won’t be subject to proper scrutiny and could even result in the companies abandoning Australia.

The Opposition leader told Anthony Albanese that his party would facilitate swift passage of the yet-to-be-seen legislation.

“I hope to work together to pass a robust law for social media age verification this year,” Mr Dutton wrote in a letter seen by The West Australian.

“This issue is of totemic significance in our community and it is time that a strong law is put in place to protect Australian children.”

The Government is understood to be eager to pass the legislation as soon as possible.

There are just two sitting weeks left in the year for both houses, while the election timing means sittings proposed for early 2025 are in doubt.

Sunita Bose, the managing director of tech and social media sector peak body DIGI, said that given the “globally unprecedented legislation” was not yet public, two weeks was not enough time for serious public consultation.

“Keeping young people safe online is a top priority for mainstream platforms, and we’re concerned that blunt restrictions that block access could push young people to darker, less safe corners of the internet,” she said.

La Trobe University researcher Alexia Maddox said that “hoping that platforms will actually put all of the money in to deal with a small Australian market and put in age verification procedures” might not fix the issue politicians wanted to solve and could backfire.

“Platforms’ bartering tools are blunt force instruments and it’s not outside of the ballpark that they will actually just withdraw or withdraw particular services,” Dr Maddox said.

“The expectation that we tell them what to do and they then say, ‘Yes, okay, I’ll do this expensive thing that you want us to do’ … and sort of doing it in an adversarial approach, rather than a working-with approach, is not going to yield friends.”

Mr Albanese announced last week his intention to ban children under the age of 16 from accessing social media.

The ban would come into effect a year after the legislation passes and the onus would be on the social media platforms to enforce it with the prospect of big fines if did not.

The Government’s persistence with the social media ban and a separate move to force platforms to take steps to deal with misinformation and disinformation also risks annoying the incoming Trump administration given the new president’s close ties with X owner Elon Musk.

Vice-president elect JD Vance said in September countries who wanted military alliances with the US should demonstrate they backed free speech.

He cited an example of a European official who “sent Elon this threatening letter that basically said we’re going to arrest you if you platform Donald Trump”, linking the regulation of social media with America’s support for NATO.

“It’s insane that we would support a military alliance if that military alliance isn’t going to be pro-free speech,” Mr Vance told prominent YouTuber Shawn Ryan.

Communications Minister Michelle Rowland and her shadow counterpart David Coleman are in talks over Coalition concerns about potential exemptions and the definition of “reasonable steps” the platforms must take.

The Government is adamant that TikTok, Snapchat, Instagram, Facebook and X would not be exempted under the new rules.

But the minister flagged that some services such as YouTube Kids could be exempt because it already had protections in place for children.

Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, has disputed the merits of the plan, saying it would be better to require the app stores run by Apple and Google to police the age ban.