Mother of murdered teenager backs social media ban for under-16s
16-year-old Brianna Ghey was murdered by two other teenagers in 2023.
The mother of a murdered teenager has urged the Prime Minister to back a ban on social media for under-16s.
Esther Ghey, whose 16-year-old daughter Brianna was murdered by two other teenagers in 2023, said a ban would be “a vital step in protecting children online”.
In a letter to party leaders Sir Keir Starmer, Kemi Badenoch and Sir Ed Davey, Ms Ghey said her daughter had had a “social media addiction” and “desperately wanted to be TikTok famous”, putting her “in constant fear about who Brianna might be speaking to online”.
She said: “She developed an eating disorder and was self-harming, and all of this was significantly exacerbated by the harmful content she was consuming online.”
Her intervention comes as peers are expected to debate an amendment to the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill later this week that would require social media companies to stop children under 16 using their platforms.
The amendment has already secured the support of the National Education Union (NEU) and 61 Labour MPs, who have written to the Prime Minister calling for “urgent action”.
NEU general secretary Daniel Kebede said the amendment was a “pivotal moment” and urged Sir Keir to show “leadership” and come out in support of a ban.
At a press conference on Monday morning, Sir Keir would not commit to supporting a ban, but said the Government was “looking at a range of options” and “no options are off the table”.
He added that he had discussed the policy with Australian prime minister Anthony Albanese, whose government introduced a ban last year.
In her letter to party leaders, Ms Ghey said she spoke “alongside many other bereaved parents who have lost their children to harms that began or were amplified online”.
Urging them to support the ban, she said: “No parent should have to live with the consequences of a system that failed to protect their child.”
However at the weekend, 42 child protection charities and online safety groups issued a joint statement warning a blanket social media ban would not deliver the improvement in child safety and wellbeing needed, and would treat “the symptoms, not the problem”.
Instead, the Government should strengthen the online safety act to require platforms to robustly enforce risk-based age limits, the organisations said.
Baroness Hilary Cass, a paediatrician who sits in the Lords, said she understands the charities’ reasoning but feels it is better to “start on presumption of ban and only allow apps that have been developed safely and do not target children with harmful algorithms”.
She told the Press Association otherwise there would be a reliance “on the US big tech companies to comply with safety requirements and so far that has just not been adequate”.
Meanwhile, the Liberal Democrats have called for film-style age ratings for social media, with some platforms legally restricted to users over the age of 16.
Party leader Sir Ed said the proposal was “a smart approach that allows young people to benefit from the best of social media…while properly tackling the real harms it can cause”.
Responding to the Liberal Democrats’ proposal in the Commons on Monday, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson said: “We’ll look carefully at any sensible proposals to make sure we can keep our children safe online.
“And I do recognise the wider issues around behaviour being a factor that affects teachers’ experiences, but also some of those wider pressures, including around safeguarding.”
