Angela Rayner has warned Nigel Farage and Reform UK that their plan to scrap online safety laws could “fail a generation of young women” by removing protections against issues such as revenge porn.
The deputy prime minister demanded Mr Farage explain how his party would ensure young women’s online safety, given Reform’s vow to repeal the Online Safety Act.
Her warning is the latest in a series of interventions by senior Labour figures regarding the act. Under rules introduced in late July, the legislation requires online platforms, including social media and search engines, to prevent children from accessing harmful content like pornography or material encouraging suicide.
Reform has vowed to repeal the law and replace it with a different means of protecting children online, though the party has not said how it would do this.
Among their criticisms of the act, Mr Farage and his colleagues have cited freedom of speech concerns and claimed the act is an example of overreach by the government.
This prompted backlash from technology secretary Peter Kyle, who claimed people like Jimmy Savile would use the internet to exploit children if he was still alive, and insisted anyone against the act – like Mr Farage – was “on their side”.
The Reform leader demanded an apology, but ministers have been trenchant in their defence of the act.
Now, the deputy prime minister has questioned how Mr Farage would seek to prevent the “devastating crime” of intimate image abuse, also known as “revenge porn”, without the Online Safety Act’s protections.
Ms Rayner claimed: “Nigel Farage risks failing a generation of young women with his dangerous and irresponsible plans to scrap online safety laws.
“Scrapping safeguards and having no viable alternative plan in place to halt the floodgates of abuse that could open is an appalling dereliction of duty. It’s time for Farage to tell women and girls across Britain how he would keep them safe online.”
Under the Online Safety Act, revenge porn is classified among the “most severe online offences”, the deputy PM added.
Citing figures from the charity Refuge, the Labour Party claimed a million young women had been subject to revenge porn: either intimate images being shared, or the threat of this.
Some 3.4 million adults in total, both men and women, have been affected, Labour also said.
Ministers have previously had to defend the Online Safety Act against accusations from Elon Musk’s X social media site that it is threatening free speech.
In a post at the start of August titled “What Happens When Oversight Becomes Overreach”, the platform formerly known as Twitter outlined criticism of the act and the “heavy-handed” UK regulators.
The government countered that it is “demonstrably false” that the Online Safety Act compromises free speech and said it is not designed to censor political debate.
Mr Farage has meanwhile suggested there is a “tech answer” for protecting children online, but neither he nor the government have outlined one.
He also suggested children are too easily able to avoid new online age verification rules by using VPNs (virtual private networks), which allow them to circumvent the rules by masking their identity and location.
When Reform UK was approached for comment, its Westminster councillor Laila Cunningham said: “Women are more unsafe than ever before thanks to Labour. Starmer has released thousands of criminals back onto the streets early with no regard for women’s safety.
“I am calling on Jess Phillips to debate me on women’s safety – she ignored the grooming gangs scandal and now she’s wilfully deceiving voters on this issue.
“Reform will always prioritise prosecuting abuse but will never let women’s safety be hijacked to justify censorship.
“You don’t protect women by silencing speech. You protect them by securing borders, enforcing the law, and locking up actual criminals, and that is exactly what a Reform government would do.”
