Communications minister Anika Wells has said she is “confident” the government will prevail in legal challenges brought by two 15-year-old Australian teenagers over the impending social-media ban.
Wells has expressed assurance that the social-media ban, coming into effect 10 December, will withstand scrutiny and succeed through High Court legal case.
In an interview with Sky News on Saturday, Wells said “We are working with the Solicitor-General on the High Court challenge that we have before us at the moment, and we’re really confident that we can put forward a very strong case and be successful. This is really important law. I’m not surprised, given how world-leading it is, that people want to have a go at knocking it off”.
The case, brought to the High Court of Australia, by two Aussie teenagers moves to challenge the federal government’s looming social-media ban for under-16s.
The 15 year olds, supported by the Digital Freedom Project, argued the new laws place an undue burden on the implied freedom of political communication.
The teens claimed that social media is used as a means for information and associations, insisting the ban will effect the most vulnerable kids the most as it fails to consider the differing needs and circumstance of minority groups.
Wells has insisted the ban should not be misunderstood as a sweeping shutdown of the internet.
“We’re not banning the internet here,” she said, “this isn’t a cure, this is a treatment plan”.
She conceded the measure won’t “absolve us of all the sins of the internet,” but pointed to the next step in reform: a planned “digital duty of care”.
Wells has stressed that “the data is in on that, and the data is horrific,” arguing that a minimum age requirement gives parents “another weapon in their arsenal” to reset the “power balance” around online use at home.
Highlighting the role of adults in children’s online lives, she cited remarks by Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European commission, from a UN event “parents should be raising children, not algorithms”.
Wells added that, at present, “algorithms have too much influence on under-16s lives”.
As the ban approaches the final stages of implementation, Wells acknowledged that the government is prepared for the possibility of more legal challenges and for a broader national debate over how effective this policy is at protecting young people in the digital age.
It’s perhaps inconvenient timing for Wells, who has also become embroiled in a row about her expenses. Her bill runs to north of $100,000 for flights to America to defend the bill, as well as a ski trip to Thredbo.
