Anthony Albanese ‘calls time’ on social media harms, backs raising minimum age to 16

Australia is poised to be the first country in the world to impose a minimum social media age of 16 as Labor backs the limit to protect children from online harms.

Australian children under 16 will not be able to access social media even if they have parental permission, while the onus will be on the big tech companies to take “reasonable steps” to ensure younger users are not on their platforms, under Labor’s age limit proposal.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has also confirmed privacy protections will be put in place around any age assurance information collected as part of the federal government’s plan to raise the social media limit to 16-years-old.

A national age limit of 16 would be a world-first for Australia, and is a major win for News Corp’s Let Them Be Kids campaign, which has raised awareness about the negative mental and physical health impacts of social media on young people and advocated for the age change.

Mr Albanese will take the proposal to a virtual meeting of national cabinet on Friday, and said he already spoken to several premiers and was confident they understood the need for a uniform approach across Australia.

Under Labor’s plan the onus will be on social media platforms to show they are taking reasonable steps to ensure underage people are not using their services, with no enforcement obligations or penalties on parents or other individuals.

The new age limit would come into effect after a 12-month implementation period, and Mr Albanese said there would be no “grandfathering arrangements” allowing underage users who already have a social media accounts to retain them.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has committed to raising the social media minimum age to 16. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman

Mr Albanese said the government would introduce privacy protections for information collected for age assurance purposes and confirmed Labor would “not allow exemptions if users have parental permission”.

In developing the policy, Mr Albanese said he had spoken to thousands of parents, grandparents, aunties and uncles who, like him, were “worried sick about the safety of our kids online”.

“We don’t argue that the changes that we will be legislating will fix everything immediately, we have laws such as people can’t buy alcohol, and from time to time that can be broken, but those laws set what the parameters are for our society, and they assist in ensuring the right outcomes,” he said.

Labor’s social media proposal will be taken to national cabinet on Friday. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman

Mr Albanese paid tribute to News Corp’s Let Them Be Kids campaign for highlighting the community concern around children’s access to social media and the negative impacts on mental and physical health.

The PM said Australia’s eSafety Commissioner will issue regulatory guidance setting out what “reasonable steps” can be taken by platforms to be assured of the age of its users.

The government will create a new definition for age-restricted social media platforms, which will be able to be flexibly narrowed through regulations to ensure there are no unintended consequences, such as educational programs accidentally getting caught up in the law.

Communications Minister Michelle Rowland says social media companies will have a year to implement the age restriction. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman

Communications Minister Michelle Rowland said the government has consulted widely with experts, parents, youth organisations, advocacy groups, academics and state and territory leaders about the proposal.

“What our approach does is hopes to achieve a balance between minimising those harms that are caused by young people accessing social media, while still enabling connection and inclusion,” she said.

“The normative value that this will provide to parents is immense.”

Anticipating complaints from the social media platforms, Ms Rowland said the one-year lead time for the age ban was to ensure the government could the “legislative intent right” and also that implementation was “capable of being done in a very practical way”.

“I would also point out that there is also a very strong case of evidence here for the fact that social media companies have been put on notice that they need to ensure that the content that they are providing, but also their practices, need to be made safer,” she said.

“We also know that the social media platforms have already announced, in some cases, versions of their services which are designed to be even safer, and I think that form of incentive regulation, even in the absence of the legislation being introduced, has been a positive.”

Ms Rowland said platforms “know their users better than anyone” and she was confident they would have capacity to comply with age assurance requirements in the future.

“It’s very important to have privacy protections in place, it is as a complex area, but it is one that we are determined to get right,” she said.

“It’s one that we are determined to implement, because we know what’s at stake,”

Ms Rowland said Labor would introduce the age limit legislation before parliament finishes for the year at the end of November.

Originally published as Anthony Albanese ‘calls time’ on social media harms, backs raising minimum age to 16