KEIR Starmer’s ban on social media for everyone under 16 is not supported by experts or evidence but is being done to save his own skin, according to a leading campaigner in the area.
Andy Burrows, the chief executive of the Molly Rose Foundation – set up in memory of 14-year-old Molly Russell, who took her own life in 2017 after viewing harmful content online – told Sky News that he was “desperately worried” about the Prime Minister’s plans.
“This was going to be a fork in the road moment,” he said. “You can tell social media companies that they are banned from serving under 16s, or you can tell them to address the product safety issues that cost Molly's life.”
Concerns are that if under-16s are banned from using sites like Facebook, X, or YouTube, the firms behind them will allow dangerous content to spread more widely, knowing that children cannot see it. However, the majority of children may then simply circumvent the ban – using tools like Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) – and be exposed to more harmful content than they are currently.
Burrows said that five separate studies in Australia, where a social media ban is already in place for under-16s, had found around 60% of children were getting around it.
Asked if Starmer was announcing the ban – which Labour MPs previously voted against – in order to “save his own skin”, the Molly Rose Foundation chief said: “I can't see what other reason that there would be.”
He went on: “I have spoken to ministers, to advisors, to people right across government, and as recently as a month ago, I was being told that they were seeing the same evidence from Australia that we were, that there were real doubts about whether this ban was enforceable, and that it wasn't something that they thought they could do.
“So, something has changed. Clearly we've got the by-election on Thursday.”
Burrows added: “If this ban unravels, if we actually see that not very much changes and children are still at risk of those worst harms, then I think those parents who might be cheering today will then be wondering why the Prime Minister changed tack very late in the day for something that the evidence doesn't support, that the experts don't have confidence in.
“They will look at the motives here.”
Northern Ireland’s First Minister Michelle O’Neill also questioned the timing of the announcement, asking whether the proposed ban was “about internal Labour Party politics as opposed to the right thing”.
Elsewhere, Plan International, the children’s charity, also warned that Labour’s planned social media ban – which Starmer said will come into effect early in 2027 – would do “nothing to tackle the dangerous misogyny and sexism that has become so rampant across social media”.
Morgan Griffith-David, senior influencing lead for UK girls’ rights at the charity, went on: “Harmful gender norms are being constantly reinforced by social media algorithms and addictive features driven by profit, not safety – and blocking access for children lets tech companies off the hook by not forcing them to address these issues.
“We all want children to be safe online, but under this ban, one day a young person will have no access to social media, and the next they turn 16 and find themselves in online spaces with no experience, preparation, or safeguards. The ban also risks pushing children towards dangerous and unregulated corners of the web, potentially exposing them to far more harmful content.”
Scotland’s Children’s Commissioner issued a similar warning, saying that banning under-16s from social media could see youngsters “driven to darker places on the internet”.
Nicola Killean, the Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland, said she was “disappointed” with the UK Government’s stance, saying that the Prime Minister’s announcement “spoke to adults only, not to the children and young people who will be most affected by these decisions”.
She went on: “Today’s announcement leaves more questions than answers. We know when a ban will happen, but not how or what it will include.
“The UK Government must urgently address children and young people directly.
“With the evidence from Australia showing that the majority of children are still on social media, children need to know that they can report harmful content without repercussions. They must not feel they are to blame and are doing something wrong.”
Leading social media companies have also cast doubt on the effectiveness of a social media ban for under-16s.
Meta, the parent company of both Facebook and Instagram, said it shared the UK Government’s “goal of keeping teens safe online”, pointing to its development of teenage accounts which “automatically limit who can contact them and the content they see”.
But a spokesperson for the company added: “Like others, we don’t think bans will achieve this goal.
“As we’ve seen in Australia, bans risk isolating teens from online communities and information, and driving them to unregulated alternatives that lack built-in protections and parental controls.
“To be both effective and easy for parents, any restrictions must be underpinned by an age verification system on devices so people aren’t asked to hand over ID to dozens of individual services to prove their age.
“We will continue to engage with the Government and Ofcom as they work to implement this policy.”
YouTube similarly warned that the bank could push children toward “less safe services”.
A YouTube spokesperson said: “We’ve invested in expert-led, age-appropriate experiences and default protections for teens for over a decade and will continue to do so.
“YouTube is a vital resource for young people, educators and parents.
“Blanket bans push kids out of such curated, supervised, beneficial experiences and towards anonymous, less safe services.”
