Article on LabourList by Andrew Kersley
Labour frontbenchers have backed a three-point
plan by the Board of Deputies to combat online hate – including
pushing the government to fine social media companies who fail to
remove abuse from their platforms.
At a ‘Connected‘ talk run by the Board of Deputies of
British Jews, the first Labour conference event ever run by the
group, shadow cabinet members and
backed
the proposed additions to the online harms bill.
The three-point plan also called for the
International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of
antisemitism to be included in community guidelines and for
community standards teams to be based in the UK.
The government’s proposed online harms bill aims
to hold companies accountable if they do not tackle harmful
content online, but little progress has been made as a
parliamentary debate on the white paper has been repeatedly
delayed.
Commenting on the plan put forward by the Board
of Deputies, Shadow Justice Secretary Lammy said: “Let me say on
those three things, it would be extraordinary not to adopt the
IHRA definition frankly.
“I think it’s incredibly difficult to properly
police this if you do not have local staff that are culturally
aware. One of the things is, very sadly because of the
devastating antisemitism that crept into the Labour Party, the
majority the government now have is significant.”
“We will do what we can as an opposition, but
clearly the key to this is in that online white paper, which has
not yet come forward despite the urgency and seriousness of these
issues.”
The government first proposed the new online
harms bill in 2019 in response to the story of 14-year-old Molly
Russell, who took her own life after viewing graphic online posts
about suicide and self-harm.
The bill aims to
create a duty of care on social media companies to
protect their users from harmful content or abuse but current
proposals do not offer regulators the ability to fine those who
fail to comply.
Thomas-Symonds suggested at the conference event
that any regulator included in the bill “has to have teeth” and
as such must have the ability to punish failing companies with
fines.
Lammy agreed: “Nick’s absolutely right about
self-regulation. We have got to get serious about this, and of
course we note in Australia they’ve gone down the road of fines
and in Germany they’ve gone down the road of serious
fines.”
Former Labour deputy leader announced in 2018 that the party would support
fines for social media companies who fail to police online abuse,
arguing that self-regulation on these sites was not
working.
Australia and Germany have both already
implemented similar laws, with social media companies in the
latter facing fines of
up to €50m if they neglect to promptly remove
problematic content.
The conference panel on combatting online hate
was chaired by the chief executive of the Board of Deputies
, and featured
former Labour MP alongside
the two shadow cabinet members.
The ex-MP for Stoke-on-Trent North vividly
described her experiences with online antisemitism, including
receiving 25,000 pieces of abuse in the 24 hours after the
Chakrabarti report was published in 2016.
Smeeth said: “I haven’t been able to wear my
Apple Watch since that weekend. Because
when you start to get death threats come through on your wrist
and on something that is physical – I have not been able to wear
it since because that was just too overwhelming for me.”
On coping with the torrent of antisemitic abuse,
she added: “I just couldn’t look at it anymore and it was how we
all needed to protect our mental health. Fundamentally, we’re all
human beings. This has real-life consequences.”
The Equalities and Human Rights Commission
(EHRC) launched
an investigation into institutional antisemitism in
the Labour Party in May last year. The final report is set to be
published in the coming weeks.
Today’s event formed part of Labour’s virtual
conference. The in-person conference was cancelled earlier this year due to Covid. The
online replacement is running events for Labour members until
September 22nd.
