Australia’s human rights commissioner wants more scrutiny over Labor’s plan to increase penalties for tech companies that fail to kick teenagers off their platforms, warning the government’s original social media ban was rushed and that mistake should not be repeated.
Commissioner Lorraine Finlay said simply introducing tougher penalties and stronger powers was unlikely to fix weaknesses in the Albanese government’s legacy social media ban, given there had been no prosecutions under the current laws to begin with.
“Strengthening a law before it has been properly operationalised risks responding to a problem that has not yet been clearly diagnosed,” she said on Wednesday.
“The original bill that introduced the social media ban was rushed through parliament, with Australians given just one day to provide submissions … Unsurprisingly, that process drew widespread criticism.”
Finlay is the latest voice pushing for Labor to allow more scrutiny of its legislative agenda, after the Greens and the Coalition teamed up this week to send the proposed social media law changes and the government’s gambling advertising package to Senate inquiries.
Both inquiries will run over parliament’s winter break, which begins next week, allowing the public and stakeholders a say on the proposed laws before they are sent to a vote when MPs return in August.
The government has argued the inquiries will delay needed reform, but Finlay welcomed the additional scrutiny after Labor this week sought to strengthen its under-16s social media ban by doubling the penalties for platforms that breach their requirements – from $49.5 million to $99 million – and giving the eSafety Commissioner more investigative powers.
The changes would allow the eSafety Commissioner to compel technology companies and their contractors to hand over internal documents, including emails, meeting minutes and communications with third-party age-verification providers, in a bid to strengthen enforcement.
The government has spruiked its social media ban as world-leading, pointing to the fact other countries are now considering similar moves. But while 5 million accounts have been removed, the rollout has been undermined by claims that teenagers are easily circumventing the ban and platforms are only loosely implementing the rules. There have been no prosecutions in the six months since the laws took effect.
Australia’s eSafety Commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, recently described the laws as a blunt-force approach and said the legislation had been developed quickly with only “very thin scaffolding”. She said she did not have potent powers.
Communications Minister Anika Wells said new powers were necessary because the regulator lacked the legal tools needed to build Federal Court cases capable of withstanding challenge. She said any delay to that process because of a Senate inquiry would be disappointing.
“I want this legislation through because I want the eSafety Commissioner to have enhanced powers so that she can get her enforcement action into court,” Wells said on Tuesday.
But Finlay said the government was framing the issue in the wrong way.
“Scrutiny is not the problem. It is a core feature of good lawmaking – particularly in complex areas like online safety, where the consequences of getting it wrong are significant and far‑reaching,” she wrote in a LinkedIn post on Wednesday.
“We have been here before.”
Finlay said the original social media ban bill was rushed through parliament, the public was given just one day to make submissions.
“Experts warned that legislation of such importance had not been afforded sufficient time for proper consideration,” Finlay wrote.
“Against that backdrop, it is entirely reasonable to ask: what has changed since the original law was passed? Where is the evidence that the existing framework has been tested and found wanting?
“If the goal is to keep children safe online, then getting the policy right matters far more than getting it done quickly. In this context, scrutiny is not an obstacle. It is the safeguard.”
Opposition communications spokeswoman Sarah Henderson said: “The devil is in the detail … Labor’s attempt to ram through the parliament new powers for the eSafety Commissioner without proper scrutiny is unacceptable.”
The Greens’ Sarah Hanson-Young said: “What we know is that the social media ban has fundamentally failed to protect young people online. It’s failed to take the big stick to big tech because it was wrong from the beginning.”
Labor has at various points been accused by the opposition and crossbench of overreach and rushing legislation since it delivered a contentious budget in May and sought to pass new laws – on tax and the National Disability Insurance Scheme – by the end of June.
Those bills were subject to three or fewer days of hearings. The NDIS inquiry has since been extended to eight weeks, but only to appease the Greens in exchange for their support for passing the tax laws.
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Natassia Chrysanthos is Federal Political Correspondent. She has previously reported on immigration, health, social issues and the NDIS from Parliament House in Canberra.Connect via X or email.From our partners
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