Britain’s MPs must seize their chance to take on the social media giants over harmful content

The moment requires radical action, and until now, politicians have been scared off by warnings they could undermine the growth of digital companies

It has taken far too long, but the penny has finally dropped. After allowing social media companies to regulate themselves under 15 voluntary codes, ministers admitted this week that this approach has failed, and a statutory regime will be needed.

Ministers are good at garnering headlines about threatening to crack down on the digital giants. They have told the tech firms to put their house in order and remove content on terrorism, hate speech, child abuse, bullying, misinformation and serious and organised crime. There is a familiar pattern: companies often deny such material exists; users who report it are ignored or left in the dark and then, when its existence is proven by others, it is belatedly removed.

The latest ministerial warnings are about material on self-harm and suicide, following the death of 14-year-old Molly Russell, whose father Ian has told movingly how “Instagram helped kill my daughter”.

Sometimes it takes a tragedy like this to prod politicians into action. Molly’s case means that many more people will be watching closely when the government issues an overdue white paper on online harms at the end of this month.

Conservatives are instinctively nervous about intervening in markets and restricting free speech. But more threats will not be enough this time.

The moment requires radical action. Ministers who “get it” include Matt Hancock, the health and social care secretary, who is due to meet Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, on Thursday. As culture secretary, Hancock showed he is one of the few senior politicians who understand the new media landscape. Such ignorance has enabled the digital giants to run rings around governments around the world, escaping proper regulation and levels of tax.

As one Whitehall insider told me: “Politicians have been scared off by warnings that they would undermine the growth of digital companies and so felt they couldn’t touch them. They have got away with it for far too long.”

Margot James, the digital minister, admitted on Tuesday: “This laissez-faire environment has led some companies to pursue growth and profitability with little regard for the security and interests of their users.” Jackie Doyle-Price, the suicide prevention minister, hinted that social media firms could be classed as publishers; they hid behind their label as platforms, even though they curate what we see on our feeds. She even suggested company bosses could face arrest.

Another idea is to impose on the firms a legal duty of care towards under-18s, which would be welcome because prevention is much better than redress after damage has been done.

However, ministers are still debating the white paper and so some of these proposals may not make the final cut. We should now judge the government by its deeds, not by what ministers float in advance. For example, a new regulator will need the power to impose swingeing fines that dent the profits of the tech firms (Facebook, which owns Instagram, saw its latest quarterly revenues rise 30 per cent to £13bn and profits increase 60 per cent to £5bn).

Ministers must learn the lesson from the paltry fines available for breaches of the law by the Electoral Commission. A new online regulator must also have the flexibility to keep pace with technological change, so the digital firms cannot exploit loopholes as easily as they have done under a regime designed for the analogue age.

The government has one shot to get this right, and cannot leave gaps, as the current patchwork system does. But the omens are not good. The cross-party Commons Science and Technology select committee expressed concern last week that the white paper “may not be as coherent, and joined-up, as it needs to be”. The MPs favour a law introduced in Gemany, forcing social media companies to respond within 24 hours when potentially illegal content is reported to them.

A useful benchmark for how radical UK ministers will be was provided today by the Labour opposition. Tom Watson, the shadow culture secretary, called for a separate internet regulator and a digital bill of rights giving people control over their own data.

Most significantly, Watson said the regulator should have the power to prevent market abuse and break up monopolies “if it is in the public interest”. The Tories won’t go that far, but Labour is right to argue that tech firms should no longer be immune to fair competition rules. However, with most of the big internet firms based in the US, such action might require international coordination. Sadly, the UK is walking away from the EU at a time when it is finally getting to grips with the challenges of the digital age.

Despite that, there is an opportunity for the government to make its mark on the global stage by outlining a groundbreaking regime in the white paper. Ministers cannot afford to miss it.