Every day, Karen Burke says she is “constantly” checking her phone, anxious about her 13-year-old daughter’s movements online.
The 55-year-old from Tunbridge Wells has turned to monitoring apps in a bid to track and limit her child’s smartphone usage, admitting that she believes her daughter is one of many teens who have become “addicted” to their devices.
She said she is forced to be “vigilant all the time” after catching her daughter trying to find ways around the restrictions – including by using her mum’s phone to change the settings on the supervision app when she isn’t looking.
Ms Burke is one of several parents who told The Independent they would “welcome” a blanket ban on social media for under-16s, after Sir Keir Starmer announced the UK government launched a consultation over social media restrictions amid growing concerns over its impact on children and young people.
“I would love to hold off until she is 18, but it’s hard if her friends all have it,” she said. “It’s the pressure of being different from everyone else – they just want to be like their friends.”
At school, her daughter doesn’t have access to social media, and Ms Burke said she believes she would be able to get used to life without it if all her friends were the same.
The government consultation comes after a group of more than 60 Labour MPs sent the prime minister an open letter urging him to back a blanket ban on social media for under-16s. In the letter, they said constituents were telling them children are “unhappy” and “anxious” and urged the government to do more to protect them.
Sir Keir previously said “no options are off the table” when it comes to changes for the use of social media for young people, leaving the door open for the UK to emulate a blanket ban that came into force in Australia in December.
But while many parents like Ms Burke support a ban, public opinion on whether the measures would actually keep under-16s from coming to harm is mixed.
Some feel it is the only solution to a problem that has been allowed to go on “too long” with “too little” regulation.
But others feel a blanket ban is a blunt instrument that will fail to get to the root of the problem, potentially pushing children towards less regulated corners of the internet.
‘This has gone on too long with too little regulation’
Nicola, 47, lives in the New Forest with her two children, aged six and nine. She said she supports a blanket social media ban, but believes it should be extended until children turn 18.
She told The Independent she believes that a ban would shift the onus away from parents and onto the government and social media companies to “protect the infrastructure of childhood”.
“I think it’s really important that they stick up for children,” she said. “Social media companies have gone on too long with too little regulation.”
While her children are still young, she feels that unless something is done now, her children will be exposed to a “huge host of negatives” including “reducing self-confidence, and reducing social skills”.
She added that children should be “free to be children” and discover themselves away from the “pressures of social media”.
“It’s an adult environment,” she said. “I do not see the purpose of it; it’s completely unnecessary for children.
“I can see all the negatives, but I can’t see any positives.”
‘I’d rather work with my children’
Jodie Lopez, 47, is a former primary school teacher who now works in educational technology and has two sons, aged nine and 12.
While she said she is “not all for” social media for children, she “worries” about the consequences of a blanket ban.
She told The Independent an outright ban could “push the problem back” until after children turn 16 without solving the core of the issue.
“I think suddenly giving children full access at 16 takes the onus off social media companies to deal with the kind of content that causes issues on the platforms,” she said.
Instead, she believes teachers and parents should work alongside children’s social media use to “train” them to use platforms sensibly and responsibly.
“If you hide it from children before 16, you can hide all the discussion away from them as well.”
She added that she believed that social media can be used “for good and for bad”, and that it can provide a “real benefit” to expand the networks of children who are isolated at school.
“I would much rather work with my children to teach them about social media when they are young enough to still need to listen to me, rather than seeing 16-year-olds suddenly get full access without any prior experience at an age when they are most likely going to try and keep it all well away from parents,” she said.
‘A ban is a start - but it can’t be in isolation’
David Paton, 48, is a father of three and headteacher at Radnor House school in Sevenoaks.
He supports an Australia-style social media ban in the first instance, but believes more needs to be done to teach children about how to prepare for a life where technology plays a central role.
“I think we need to have a much broader discussion between legislators, educators, and parents about how we are bringing children up today,” he said.
“Where does technology fit into that? How are we equipping them for the future? I think this ban is a step towards that, but I think it’s the first step of many.”
He said as a parent, he has tried to “equip them [children] with the skillset to be able to make good decisions when parents aren’t looking, rather than banning things outright”.
But he also said he has seen the positive impacts straightforward bans can have after his school barred children from using smartphones ten years ago. The rule has “hugely increased the amount of social interaction children have during the day,” he believes.
“I think you need to educate, rather than come up with hard and fast rules,” he said. “But I think the ban is the right thing to do.”
