Fifth Special Report - The Draft Online Safety Bill and the legal but harmful debate: Government Response to the Committee’s Eighth Report

This is the government's response, published 24 March 2022.

Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.

The government welcomes the report, says it is "accepting eight of the Committee's recommendations", agrees with the policy intent in some areas but would deliver it differently, and disagrees with others.

• On designation of harms, it agrees with the Committee and has updated the Bill so that changes to the regulations specifying types of harm are subject to the affirmative resolution procedure, as well as the initial regulations.
• It does not adopt the proposed freedom of expression "must balance" test, saying it "would delegate an inappropriate degree of power to a regulator" if overseen by Ofcom.
• On enforcement, it states that Ofcom will have the power to audit a service's systems, and that senior management liability for non-compliance with information requests will come into force "shortly after Royal Assent".
• It will "not be supporting the establishment of a permanent Joint Committee on Digital Regulation", but intends to work with Parliament to support scrutiny of the Online Safety Act.

Read the government's response ↗ Report an error