Self-harm Act
SOCIAL media is infested with dangerous content such as self-harm videos.
So it’s understandable that ministers should wish to protect children from such vile material on the internet.
But the Online Safety Act designed to protect kids has ended up becoming a blunt tool to censor free speech.
New laws introduced last week put a ban on “legal but harmful” material.
But it is so wide a term that it risks morphing into sinister state control.
The new Act has already led to users on X being barred from viewing images from anti-immigration protests by anonymous moderators.
It’s only a matter of time before any kind of political content ends up being deleted for unexplained, anti-democratic reasons.
The Act was sold as being necessary to prevent vulnerable children seeing content related to the likes of suicide, eating disorders and pornography.
But an 1,800 per cent increase in downloads of VPN blockers — used to disguise the country of origin of internet users — shows that any tech-savvy teen can get round basic age verification checks.
In the cause of banning hurty words, ministers have instead ended up curbing freedom of expression while doing nothing to improve safety.
The real abusers — who mainly operate from abroad anyway — will carry on with their evil activity.
Boom ’n’ bust
IT is simply unsustainable for Britain to be able to absorb a population explosion as massive as the one we have been subjected to in the last two years.
Numbers in England and Wales grew by 706,881 in 2024 and 821,210 in 2023.
That has taken the total to nearly 62million.
What preparations did the Tories — who shamefully lost control of immigration in these years — make for such a fundamental change? Absolutely none.
With a housing shortage, an NHS in crisis and a daily battle to keep the lights on and the water pumping, Labour must get numbers down.
Migration on this scale — especially when so many are low-skilled workers — is ruinously bad for the economy.
It ends up costing more to house and look after them than they contribute.
No one voted for any of this.
Pride in Ozzy
BIRMINGHAM did its favourite son Ozzy Osbourne proud yesterday.
The old showman would have loved the huge turnout for him in his native city.
No doubt looking down from his black throne in rock heaven, Ozzy will have had a message for his many fans:
No more tears.
