Writing for The Mirror Tracy Gilbert, Vice Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Commercial Sexual Exploitation, says ministers must back safeguards to stop pornography sites allowing sex abuse and exploitation
Opportunities to stop widespread sexual exploitation and child abuse overnight don’t come often, but right now the Government has one.
In just a matter of weeks, all pornography websites could be forced to verify that everyone in their videos is an adult, gave permission for the video to be published and are able to withdraw their consent at any time.
If the Government says ‘yes’. You might reasonably have assumed these basic safeguards were already in place. They are not. And the results are horribly predictable. Mainstream pornography sites have repeatedly been found hosting child abuse, sexual violence and trafficking victims.
How has this been possible? Because pornography websites don’t even check whether the people in their videos are adults – let alone whether they know a video of them has been published.
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And it’s not just ‘home-made’ videos that are the source of this violation. I recently heard from the courageous survivor Alia Azariah, who was coerced and abused in the pornography industry. Alia told me and fellow MPs that despite the ‘pornography’ of her being a record of “the most difficult moments of my past”, she is powerless to remove the videos.
This is utterly wrong. No one – without exception – should have pornography of them published without their consent. On 2 March, the House of Lords voted to force pornography websites to verify the age and ongoing consent of everyone on their platform.
These safeguards are consistent with the Online Safety Act and recognise the pornography trade is fundamentally different to the mainstream film industry – demanding different regulations.
The safeguards are backed by charities including UK Feminista, Barnardo’s, CEASE and, crucially, survivors. Now, with the Crime and Policing Bill returning to the Commons, Government must choose whether to keep the safeguards or ditch them. Ultimately, this comes down to whose rights the state decides to prioritise and protect: pornographers’ – or the men, women and children they make money off.
It’s time to show whose side we’re on.