Vital Changes Secured to the Regulation of Online Pornography

Online pornography is not just entertainment, it has become a harmful form of education.

It promotes the idea that pain for women is pleasure for men. It instils the notion that to be close to a woman is to dominate or degrade her. It trains brains to link dopamine and endorphin production to violent, degrading, and in some cases paedophilic-adjacent content.

And from Wayne Couzens to Dominique Pelicot, we know how the consumption of online sexualised violence can turn into offline violence.

I was glad, therefore, to have yesterday secured vital changes to the way we regulate online pornography.

As a result of amendments tabled by me in the Commons and Baroness Bertin in the Lords, the Crime and Policing Bill will now:

• Ban pornographic content depicting strangulation or suffocation

• Ban pornographic content in which performers role-play as children

• Ban pornographic content that features step-incest, where one performer appears to be underage

• Grant powers to the Government to require pornography websites to proactively verify the age and consent of those featured on their sites – and allow for the retrospective withdrawal of that consent.

These changes reflect the reality that online pornography is fuelling the epidemic of violence against women and girls, encouraging a sexual interest in children, and facilitating commercial sexual exploitation, including trafficking.

I’d like to thank all of the organisations and campaigners who supported us to get here including Barnardo's, CEASE UK, UK Feminista, and the APPG on Commercial Sexual Exploitation.