But the Australian experiment, flawed as it may be, highlights just how far Britain has fallen behind in protecting children from the documented harms of social media. While Canberra acts decisively, London continues its policy paralysis, leaving parents and schools to fend for themselves against platforms designed to exploit children\u2019s developing minds.<\/p>\n
Indeed, recent US government research from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention<\/a>, America\u2019s national public health agency, shows that half of all teenagers now spend four or more hours daily on screens, while 93 per cent of Gen Z admit to losing sleep by staying up past bedtime due to social media, according to the American Academy of Sleep Medicine.<\/p>\n Treat yourself or a friend this Christmas to a New Statesman subscription for just \u00a32 <\/p>\n The UK government\u2019s response has been to issue toothless guidance suggesting headteachers \u201cconsider\u201d restricting phone use, counsel so weak that it prompted hundreds of school leaders to write directly to Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson, demanding statutory action.<\/p>\n When that plea fell on deaf ears, some parents took matters into their own hands. Will Orr-Ewing, Pete Montgomery, Katie Moore, and 17-year-old Flossie McShea have launched a Judicial Review against the Secretary of State for Education. \u201cWe know that as a family, we won\u2019t have the strength to resist giving our kids phones if all their friends have them,\u201d Orr-Ewing told me. \u201cThat\u2019s why government action is necessary.\u201d<\/p>\n The 40-year-old father of three argued that Britain is experiencing a \u201csleeper scandal\u201d because children don\u2019t tell parents about harmful content. He sees three \u201ctoxic streams\u201d flowing through smartphones: \u201cviolent content, sexual content, and dangerous strangers. Children don\u2019t search for this; it comes to them.\u201d<\/p>\n The campaign has enlisted Flossie, a teen from Devon who testified that the Department for Education had failed to protect her and her peers from harm. She describes how girls assume they\u2019re being filmed throughout the day, either posing or hiding their faces, leaving little cognitive capacity for learning. The \u201cAirDropping\u201d of violent and sexual content during lesson time has become routine. \u201cOnce you see certain images, you can\u2019t unsee them,\u201d she explained, still haunted by a video showing one child accidentally killing another.<\/p>\n \u201cMost people of our generation have never seen a beheading video,\u201d Orr-Ewing continued, \u201cyet the majority of 11-13 year olds have. This shows how the guard rails have been liquefied.\u201d<\/p>\n Australia\u2019s blunt instrument approach may be problematic, but at least it acknowledges the scale of the crisis. The ban has been condemned for its rushed parliamentary passage and its vague enforcement mechanisms. Privacy advocates warn about the data collection required for age verification, while youth groups argue they\u2019ve been excluded from decisions directly affecting their lives.<\/p>\n Australia\u2019s Communications Minister Anika Wells acknowledged she expects \u201cteething problems\u201d but insisted the ban was about protecting Gen Alpha (anyone under 15) from what she described as young people being connected to a \u201cdopamine drip\u201d from smartphones. \u201cWith one law, we can protect Generation Alpha from being sucked into purgatory by the predatory algorithms described by the man who created the feature as \u2018behavioural cocaine\u2019,\u201d Wells said.<\/p>\n That man is Aza Raskin, who designed the infinite scroll in 2006, one of social media\u2019s most addictive features. Speaking to BBC Panorama in 2018, Raskin warned: \u201cIt\u2019s as if they\u2019re taking behavioural cocaine and just sprinkling it all over your interface, and that\u2019s the thing that keeps you coming back and back and back. Behind every screen on your phone, there are generally literally a thousand engineers that have worked on this thing to try to make it maximally addicting.\u201d<\/p>\n Despite this insider testimony about deliberate addiction engineering, Australia\u2019s critics raise valid concerns: the legislation leaves \u201creasonable steps\u201d undefined and age verification remains imperfect. Most troubling is the policy\u2019s disregard for social media\u2019s legitimate benefits for isolated teenagers and LGBTQ+ youth.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Britain\u2019s alternative \u2014 essentially doing nothing while hoping platforms self-regulate \u2014 appears even less defensible. \u201cIt is a question of getting the harm versus benefit equation into realistic proportion,\u201d Orr-Ewing argues. The government\u2019s reluctance stems from misplaced faith in parental responsibility, while ignoring the fundamental asymmetry of power: individual families cannot compete with platforms that employ neuroscientists and behavioural economists to maximise addictive engagement.<\/p>\n \u201cOne day, we hope the devices will be sufficiently safe for this issue to be returned to a family or school\u2019s responsibility,\u201d Orr-Ewing said. \u201cHowever, there are times of such significant historical upheaval, often with the introduction of radical new forms of technology, when the state has a duty to intervene and protect the most vulnerable: in this case, children.\u201d<\/p>\n International evidence suggests targeted interventions work. South Australia\u2019s school phone bans produced a 54 per cent drop in behavioural problems<\/a> and a 63 per cent decline in social media incidents. France and the Netherlands are implementing similar nationwide school bans.<\/p>\n Britain could learn from these examples. A statutory ban on smartphones in schools would address immediate educational disruption while maintaining young people\u2019s access to digital communities outside school hours. Clear regulations on platform design would tackle harmful business models without eliminating access entirely.<\/p>\n Orr-Ewing believes taking action represents a rare political opportunity for Labour: \u201cThis is so popular, and it\u2019s cross-cultural, bipartisan and cross-demographics. The only people who don\u2019t want it are the big tech lobbyists.\u201d He sees it as a way for Sir Keir Starmer to demonstrate that \u201cchildren are in a different category\u201d.<\/p>\n When 42 per cent of UK teenagers admit their phones distract them from schoolwork most weeks<\/a>, we\u2019re witnessing a public health crisis requiring policy intervention. Yet as tech companies reportedly lobby against Australia\u2019s bold approach to curbing the influence of social media<\/a>, British policymakers continue their studied inaction, gambling that voluntary initiatives can somehow contain platforms engineered to be irresistible.<\/p>\n The stakes extend beyond individual children\u2019s wellbeing. Australia\u2019s willingness to confront Big Tech directly challenges the industry\u2019s global business model. If successful, other nations may follow suit, threatening the unfettered access to young minds that sustains social media profits.<\/p>\n Westminster can either lead by example with targeted interventions that protect children while preserving digital benefits, or remain a useful idiot for Silicon Valley by pretending market forces will somehow solve problems they deliberately created.<\/p>\n This Christmas, as British teens unwrap smartphones while Australian equivalents are, in theory, prohibited from accessing social media, we\u2019ll discover whether courage or cowardice better serves young people\u2019s interests. The early signs suggest that doing something imperfect beats doing nothing at all.<\/p>\n![](\"https:\/\/dl6pgk4f88hky.cloudfront.net\/2021\/09\/TNS_master_logo.svg\"){kind=logo}
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