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Internet and Video Games

I am extremely pleased to be speaking under your chairmanship, Mr. Bercow. Given that we have discussed children extensively, I hope that you will not rule me out of order if I take the opportunity to record the admiration felt by the entire House for the excellent work that you do in promoting special needs education for children and reform in that area. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford (Mr. Whittingdale), the Chairman of the Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport, on producing such a timely and useful report. However, I have one or two minor criticisms, which I shall make in the most respectful manner. I also thank the hon. Member for Bath (Mr. Foster)—hon. Members should know by now that he is my mentor—for being commendably brief; he knows that I may be under a time restraint. I apologise to the Minister in advance, but I have an Adjournment debate in the main Chamber. It should not cut into our debate, but if it does I shall have to slink off. I also congratulate all hon. Members on their contributions. All children now effectively have access to the internet, so it is incumbent on policy makers to debate how to protect children from harmful content. A number of specific examples of what the internet is capable of producing have been cited. We are in a very new age. Protecting children from harmful content even five or 10 years ago was pretty straightforward. We had to ensure that they did not watch the wrong television programmes and did not get hold of the wrong magazines, but now they can get hold of any material they like via the computer, and also on the mobile phone. The Select Committee’s report sets out in clear detail the sort of developments created by the internet. We heard not only about access to extreme content—pornography, violence and radicalisation—but about potential changes in behaviour. The ability of unsavoury people and sexual predators to make contact with young children is a unique feature of the internet. However, it has also changed the conduct of young children. Phrases have entered the mainstream vocabulary that were not part of it five years ago, such as cyberbullying and happy slapping. Those phrases are directly attributable to changes in technology; it gives people an incentive to behave in a certain way, which would not have happened previously. Of course, bullying existed before the internet, as did mugging, but the internet provides a bizarre focus for such behaviour.