Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has applauded the South Australian Government on its moves to ban children from social media. Source: SBS News.
South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas earlier this month appointed a former High Court chief justice to examine pathways for his government to impose a social media ban on Australians under 14.
Under the proposal, parents would also have to give their consent for children aged 14 and 15 to access a social media account.
Having spoken to concerned parents, Mr Albanese welcomed efforts to explore age restrictions.
“Parents are worried sick about what their kids have access to online – it is a major social issue in this country,” he told reporters yesterday.
“I applaud (the premier’s) leadership on this issue.”
Parents were concerned about their children having access to inappropriate material online and the mental health impacts of social media, Mr Albanese said.
However, any age requirement initiatives must be proven to work.
“We want to make sure that any measures that are put in place are effective, because one of the concerns which is there is that age protocols may be circumvented.”
The Albanese Government committed $6.5 million in its budget to pilot “age assurance technologies” and investigate how they could prevent children from accessing inappropriate and harmful online content.
Funding from a $43.2 million communications package would be used to respond to “emerging and evolving online harms” and $1.4 million would be earmarked for the office of the online safety watchdog over two years.
The federal government is also creating a parliamentary committee to examine the consequences of online content on Australian society.
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Prime minister ‘applauds’ South Australian move to ban children from social media (SBS News)
