Zoe McKenzie (Flinders, Liberal Party, Shadow Cabinet Secretary) | Hansard source

Julie Inman Grant compared the government's mechanism for banning social media accounts for under-16-year-olds as the equivalent of sticking a pink parking ticket on a windshield. In March, the Social media minimum age: compliance update report from the eSafety Commissioner reassuringly told us that 4.7 million age restricted accounts were removed or restricted from the designated platforms as at mid-December. It's not bad, given that we only have about 1.5 million 13-to-16-year-olds.

But talk to any parent and they will tell you that the ban's implementation has been far too hit and miss. The University of Newcastle carefully studied the ban's implementation, following around 400 people between the ages of 12 and 17 in the period when the law came into effect. What did they find? More than 85 per cent of adolescents under 16 continued to use the restricted social media platforms, predominantly via their own accounts. Two-thirds may have encountered an age verification test that was easily passed by a self-declared age or by uploading a selfie.

What else did the study find? That this government's attempt to ban social media accounts for under-16-year-olds, which we had supported in 2024, in good faith, because, after all, we had been the original proponents of the ban. But that had largely and unacceptably failed.

During question time today, government members, led by huffer-and-puffer-in-chief, the Minister for Communications, were outraged about the simple act taken by the Senate last night to refer—

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