MEMBER FOR MENZIES GABRIEL NG: So, we’re lucky in Menzies to have some fantastic schools that people move into the area for, some of the best state schools in Victoria.

So, without further ado, I’ll hand over to the Communications Minister. Thank you.

MINISTER FOR COMMUNICATIONS ANIKA WELLS: Thank you, Gabe. It’s great to be here with Gabe, one of our absolute stars of class of 2025, who is not just extremely talented but diligent. Straight on my case, please come to one of my schools, East Doncaster Secondary College, to talk to the kids about some of these big, important policies that are leading the world, that will change their lives, hear their experiences, and answer their questions about what the impacts will be for them. So, it’s a pleasure to have done that this morning. Some very bright sparks in the media class asking us about what not just the social media ban looks like, but about media regulation, the future of news media in this country, and Gabe and I are the richer for having spent some time with them this morning.

These social media laws are world-leading, and when we went to the UN several weeks ago, it was significant how many other countries wanted to engage with us about the how and the why of what we are doing. These laws will not mean perfection, but they will mean a significant and meaningful difference, and they will spread cultural change across 13 to 16-year-olds in this country.

Unfortunately, seven out of 10 young Australians have seen things online that they shouldn’t have, that has done them harm. That stat is too horrifying to ignore, and so we have acted. And the social media laws are now less than two months until they come into law, into implementation, and we are working through all of that. I met just yesterday with the platforms about what this looks like for them, any questions they had of us ahead of their obligation to deliver on 10 December.

And today, we are also announcing a national advertising campaign that commences on 19 October. It’s called For The Good Of, and it means for the good of our kids. We’re doing these things, ultimately, for the good of young people in Australia. It will span television, radio, digital. We just asked the kids if there’s anywhere else and anything else we should be thinking of, and we look forward to continuing that conversation. But in the meantime, happy to take any questions.

JOURNALIST: Where will the young people be seeing this advertising campaign?

WELLS: There will be some on billboards near schools around the country. They’ll see it on TV. They’ll see it online. They’ll see it, ironically, on social media, because until the 10th of December, it is legal for kids to be on social media. And if that’s where they are, that’s where we need to talk to them about what this means and why we’re doing it.

JOURNALIST: How are they feeling about losing access to social media, those students you spoke to?

WELLS: Look, the vast majority of students that I speak to are happy and grateful that these laws are coming in. It’s not the case for everybody. I think we’re particularly attuned to the fact that people who are 13, 14 and 15 are having something taken away, rather than kids who are under 13 who will just meet the new law as it exists. And also, for kids who are 16 or over who may be suffering harm online but won’t actually have their account taken away.

We’re cognisant of all that. We’re working through all that, and occasions like today are opportunities for Gabe and I to ask kids, particularly those aged between 13 and 16, if there’s anything that we haven’t considered that we should be considering, and anything that we might not be doing that we should be doing.

JOURNALIST: It surprises me that they’d be grateful to lose something like this, knowing teenagers myself.

WELLS: Perhaps grateful is too strong a word, but a sense of gratitude that something that I think at the moment you are socially isolated for opting out of. This is something that everybody is online, a sense that if you don’t have your own TikTok account you are missing out on something. I think the gratitude is that this law applies to everybody, and that everybody will face the same cultural expectation that kids are not online on a social media account between the ages of 13 to 16.

I think the sense that everybody will be facing a new world, everybody will need to interact with each other face to face the way that people used to do, I think is ultimately seen as a good thing. When if you also ask those same kids, I suggest they’ll be able to tell you about harms they or their friends have experienced online as well.

JOURNALIST: The campaign really targets parents, but will there also be materials targeting children specifically?

WELLS: Yes, that’s right. And you will see we’re previewing some of that for you today. Because we are announcing the National Awareness Campaign and those materials will be on TV, be on air from Sunday from the 19th of October.

Because this is an awareness campaign as well as acting to regulate online harms. It is not the case that the buck stops here. It is the case that this is the first tranche of reforms in online safety. Once we land these reforms on 10 December, once the platforms comply with Australian law come 10 December, the next space we’re moving into is digital duty of care, which looks at what obligations platforms who have customers on Australia, who seek to transact business and make commercial revenue in Australia, what obligations they have to their customers. That is digital duty of care.

JOURNALIST: Did you compel the social media giants you met with to come to yesterday’s Senate inquiry, and do you support plans to subpoena them?

WELLS: As a humble, hardworking member of the House of Representatives, what happens in the other place is not for me to compel - I think is the word that you used there. I absolutely met with digital platforms yesterday because, ahead of 10 December, the eSafety Commissioner and I wanted to make ourselves available to answer all of their questions and help them work through any last concerns they had about how they deliver on their obligations come 10 December.

JOURNALIST: So, they weren’t compelled …?

WELLS: Like I said, that’s a Senate inquiry, so you’d have to speak with the chair of that particular committee.

JOURNALIST: And are you talking to Meta about news bargaining and incentive laws?

WELLS: The Assistant Treasurer Daniel Mulino who has carriage of the News Media Bargaining Code who works collaboratively with myself, with news media stakeholders, continue to do work in that space because it’s important and we can all agree upon that.

JOURNALIST: Who exactly did you meet with yesterday?

WELLS: Yesterday, I met with Snapchat, I met with Meta and I met with TikTok.

JOURNALIST: And who were the representatives specifically?

WELLS: I am not going to name individual names.

JOURNALIST: What are their positions roughly? How high up in the organisation does that meeting sort of take place?

WELLS: There was a mix. Some people brought founders, some people brought government relations people. That was their choice.

JOURNALIST: And what did they raise when you spoke to them?

WELLS: Lots of them had individual questions of the eSafety Commissioner. I think what’s remarkable about these meetings is that the eSafety Commissioner and I got together and offered ourselves in the one meeting so that both the platform can see we are in lockstep about this policy, both the imperatives behind it policy-wise that I govern and the regulation of it that Julie Inman Grant, the eSafety Commissioner governs, which gave them the opportunity to ask us questions about the delivery, and we also took the opportunity I guess to ask about things like compliance plans, particular tools that they’re going to use for age assurance, just making sure that the communication channels are open and cooperative ahead of 10 December.

JOURNALIST: And are you satisfied that they will be doing all the right things by you?

WELLS: I am confident they understand their obligations under Australian law and they will deliver upon their obligations for 10 December.

JOURNALIST: What are the consequences if they don’t?

WELLS: Fines of up to $49.5 million for cases of systemic breach, and I think it’s clear to say out of those meetings, they all understand their obligations under Australian law.

JOURNALIST: Are you confident the government won’t just be playing whack-a-mole with the social media platforms that other people might turn to, like Roblox?

WELLS: I think the eSafety Commissioner has recently said some things about Roblox that you might be interested in. This is definitely not set and forget laws. Obviously, this is a fast-evolving space and we will keep attuned to minimising online harms, not just for young Australians but for all Australians, and that’s why I said the next big piece of work in the online safety space is working on digital duty of care and consultation for that opens soon.

JOURNALIST: How confident are you in the age assurance technology the platforms will be using and what accuracy rate do they have for detecting underage users?

WELLS: You would have seen a 1200-page report back on age assurance that tells us that age assurance can be effective, it can be safe, and it will work. It’s going to look a little bit different for each platform. They’ve all got their own intellectual property. They’re obviously all rivals with one another. We’re not going to regulate universal methods for compliance. That’s up to them to determine. But it is up to them to determine what age assurance methods they will be using to comply with Australia law.

JOURNALIST: Are you confident that they’ll work?

WELLS: Yes. I’m confident that it can work and it is up to the platforms to make sure that it does.

JOURNALIST: And what is the monitoring mechanism? Is there an organisation overseeing this? How is it being policed?

WELLS: The eSafety Commissioner.

JOURNALIST: And you’re confident that they have the resourcing and the ability to do this?

WELLS: Absolutely.

JOURNALIST: And what will it physically look like in two months when the laws hit? What will young people experience on their devices? How will that actually all work on day one?

WELLS: That’s a great question and that’s some of the things that we’ve been working through with platforms over the past few months now that they have both the rules and the regulatory advice. Let’s be clear that these are obligations upon social media platforms that operate in Australia. These are not laws upon young Australians or their parents. The obligation is on the platform to comply with the law. So, like I’ve said to them all and reiterated again yesterday, my expectation is that they will provide notifications to accounts in the run-up to 10 December saying that we have conducted age assurance and we have identified your account as being one that is belonging to someone who is aged under 16. Therefore, come 10 December, it is our obligation under Australia law that we will have to deactivate this account. If we are wrong, here is a clear appeals process that you can go through. And my expectation is that those things happen in the run-up to 10 December, not after 10 December.

JOURNALIST: How much money is being spent on the advertising campaign?

WELLS: About $14 million.

JOURNALIST: So just on Optus, why didn’t the department set up an email forwarding when they changed their notification email only a week before, and what’s being done to follow up?

WELLS: The department advised each of the telcos about the change in email address and I think it’s a reasonable expectation for Australian taxpayers to have that if the Federal Department of Communications advises you to use a particular email address for alerts that you do so.

JOURNALIST: And on the Parliament Sports Club, do you think it’s okay that the gambling lobby group Responsible Wagering sponsors the Parliament Sports Club?

WELLS: I think you would have seen the Andy Turnbull comment on this earlier today. I think as with all ways that Responsible Wagering Australia interacts with parliamentarians and particular structures within the parliament, they need to be open, accountable, transparent, they need to disclose that. And I am told that they have done that with the usual methods.

JOURNALIST: You think that the current arrangement is fine? You’re fine with it?

WELLS: Speaking for myself, I have not met with Responsible Wagering Australia as the Minister for Communications and Minister for Sport. That is my choice. But if they are upholding the lobbyist code of conduct in all of their obligations under [inaudible]… that is a question for each parliamentarian to engage with.