Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 7 November 2019

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment

Session 3: The State of Play in Regulation

Photo of Richard BrutonRichard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I congratulate the committee members and other parliamentarians on this initiative. The background to the regulatory environment in Ireland is very much set in our broad plan on online safety. It involves several Departments, including the Departments of Communications, Climate Action and Environment, Justice and Equality, Health, Taoiseach, Children and Youth Affairs, and Education and Skills. I am a former Minister of the latter Department, which provides strong online support mechanisms for students and schools. The plan has a broad base. The principles of what we are trying to do are clear and well set out in the committee's documentation. They include transparency, accountability and protecting citizens while also respecting freedom of expression.

The devil is in the detail when it comes to regulation. There are several main regulatory developments under way in Ireland. I could name at least six. The regulation of harmful online content, to which I will return, is being pursued by my Department. The Department of Justice and Equality is facilitating a consultation on the regulation of hate speech and hate crime. Regulation of transparency of political advertising has been developed in the context of an electoral commission that is being drafted and that will deal with the regulation of elections, including funding, which is another element. Private Members' legislation supported by the Government has proposed the creation of new criminal offences relating to images displayed without consent.

Stronger protections relating to cybersecurity and cyberattacks are also relevant to my area. The approach we are taking to online safety, for which I am directly responsible, is not dissimilar to that being taken in Australia. We propose to define harmful content, require companies to have a code of practice and put an online safety commissioner in place to oversee the delivery of those codes of practice. That online safety commissioner would receive third party complaints and could, on his or her own initiative, require takedown or notify companies that their code was inadequate. Non-compliance with the directions of an online safety commissioner would be a crime and the commissioner could publish details of non co-operation. That legislation is in development and we have had consultations on it, as Ms Dixon indicated.

Consultations are also ongoing on the area of hate speech. There are issues around that and the characteristics of certain groups that have been defined. Some argue that the bar is very high under the existing incitement to hatred legislation. The definition of "hatred" in that legislation stipulates that an intention or likelihood to stir up hatred must be demonstrated. We are also considering whether such laws adequately deal with online content. Those issues are being developed.

This week, the Government announced the initiation of legislation to deal with political advertising, which will define political advertising, require its clear identification and labelling, and require the disclosure of any targeting or engagement metrics being used. There is quite a bit of legislative initiative under development. We also need to educate people and equip them with the right tools to help them be discerning in their use of the Internet. That balance is very strong.

There is no doubt that the power of the Internet is accelerating. When I was Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, we discussed aspects such as social, mobile, the cloud, and big data. It has now moved on to the Internet of things and AI. Principles of operation will be embedded within those areas, which should be subject to regulation. This is a very tricky area for governments and it is absolutely essential that we work together across countries. Media and politics are at the front line of this invasiveness, but it will start to move into other areas of our lives. We need to decide the principles underpinning the roles of artificial intelligence, big data, micro targeting and so on. This is a challenging area and this initiative is worthwhile in bringing countries together to be a part of this group.

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