My Lords, this has been miscellany, indeed. We must be making progress if we are picking up amendments such as these. I thank noble Lords who have spoken to the amendments and the issues covered in them.
I turn first to Amendment 185A brought to us by the noble Lord, Lord Bassam of Brighton, which seeks to add duties on online marketplaces to limit children’s access to the sale of knives, and proactively to identify and remove listings which appear to encourage the sale of knives for the purposes of violence or self-harm. Tackling knife crime is a priority for His Majesty’s Government; we are determined to crack down on this violent scourge, which is devastating our communities. I hope that he will forgive me for not drawing on the case he mentioned, as it is still sub judice.
However, I certainly take the point he makes; we are all too aware of cases like it up and down the country. I received an email recently from Amanda and Stuart Stephens, whose son, Olly, was murdered by two boys, one of whom was armed with a knife. All these cases are very much in our minds as we debate the Bill.
Let me try to reassure them and the noble Lord as well as other Members of the Committee that the Bill, through its existing duties and other laws on the statute book, already achieves what the noble Lord seeks with his amendment. The sale of offensive weapons and of knives to people under the age of 18 are criminal offences. Any online retailer which directly sells these prohibited items can already be held criminally liable. Once in force, the Bill will ensure that technology platforms, including online marketplaces, prevent third parties from using their platform to sell offensive weapons or knives to people under the age of 18. The Bill lists both these offences as priority offences, meaning that user-to-user services, including online marketplaces, will have a statutory obligation proactively to prevent these offences taking place on their services.
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I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson of Balmacara, for his support for the government amendments. The Government are committed to ensuring that the regime set up by the Bill is cost-neutral to the taxpayer. As such, it will be funded via annual fees on regulated services the revenue from which is at or above a set revenue threshold. At present, Ofcom is preparing for its new duties as regulator, and funding this by the retention of receipts under the Wireless Telegraphy Act 2006. Once the Bill that we are debating in this Committee is in place, Ofcom will charge fees to recoup this money alongside funding its ongoing costs. As the Bill is still before this Committee, Ofcom has not yet been granted the information-gathering powers which are necessary to prepare the fee regime. This means it cannot issue information requests for financial information from firms. As such, only when the Bill passes will Ofcom be able to begin implementing the fee regime.
In consideration of this, the Government have decided that fees should be charged from the financial year 2025-26 at the earliest. The decision does not affect implementation timings for any other areas of the regime. Amendments 186A to 186C will ensure that the fee regime functions in a fair and practical manner under these timings. The amendments ensure that the costs that Ofcom incurs while preparing for, and exercising, its online safety functions are met by the retention of receipts under the Wireless Telegraphy Act, up until the point when the fee regime is operational. They also ensure that these costs are recovered in a proportionate manner by extending the Schedule 10 recouping regime. I hope that that will have the support of this Committee.
Amendment 200 seeks to expand the definition of “skilled person” to include a regulator or self-regulatory body. I assure the noble Lord, Lord Allan of Hallam, that the Bill’s definition of a “skilled person” is already sufficiently broad to include a regulator or self-regulatory body. As set out in Clause 207(1), the Bill’s existing definition of “person” includes “any organisation or
association of persons”. This means that the Bill’s definition of “skilled person” enables Ofcom to appoint an individual, organisation, body of persons or association of persons which appears to it to have the skills necessary to prepare a specific report. That includes a regulator or self-regulatory body, as the noble Lord’s amendment suggests.
On regulatory co-operation, I am conscious that I promised the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, further details on this when he asked about it in an earlier grouping, so I shall set them out now so that he can consult them in the official record. I reassure the noble Lord and other noble Lords that Ofcom has strong existing relationships with domestic regulators. That has been supported by the establishment of the Digital Regulation Cooperation Forum, which we have discussed before. Effective regulatory co-ordination is essential for addressing the cross-cutting opportunities and challenges posed by digital technologies and services.
The creation of the forum was a significant step forward in delivering greater coherence at the institutional level and has been widely welcomed by industry and consumer representatives. Its formation has been particularly timely in bringing together the key regulators involved in the proposed new online safety, data and digital competition regimes. Its work has already delivered real and wide-ranging impact, including landmark policy statements clarifying the interactions between digital regulatory regimes, research into cross-cutting issues and horizon-scanning activities on new regulatory challenges. It is important to note that the Information Commissioner’s Office is a member of the forum. We will continue to assess how best to support collaboration between digital regulators and ensure that their approaches are joined up.
In addition, Ofcom already has a statutory footing to share information with UK regulators under the Communications Act 2003. Section 393 of that Act includes provisions for sharing information between Ofcom and other regulators in the UK, such as the Information Commissioner’s Office, the Financial Conduct Authority and the Competition and Markets Authority. So, we believe the issues set out in the amendment are covered.
Let me turn now to the cunning amendments from the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, which seek to introduce special provisions to apply in cases where a notice issued under Clause 110 would involve the monitoring of journalistic material or material identifying journalistic sources. I appreciate the way he has set those out and I am very happy to have the more detailed discussion with the Bill team that he suggested. Let me just say, though, that the Government are fully committed to protecting the integrity of journalistic material and there is no intention that the technologies required under Clause 110 in relation to private communications would identify anything other than child sexual abuse and exploitation content. These powers are subject to strong safeguards to protect the privacy of all users. Any technologies required on private communications must be accredited by Ofcom as being highly accurate in detecting only child sexual exploitation and abuse content. These minimum standards of accuracy will be approved and published by the Secretary of State
following advice from Ofcom and will ensure that it is highly unlikely that journalistic material that is not such content would be erroneously flagged or removed.