MINISTER FOR COMMUNICATIONS ANIKA WELLS: Australia is leading the global effort to protect children from the harms of social media. It's been six months now since our world-leading social media minimum age laws came into place and I am not satisfied that the social media companies are doing everything in their power to keep under-16s off their platforms. In fact, it is clear to me that these companies are taking a leaf straight out of the big tech playbook and are trying to get away with the bare minimum. Today, Australia is sending a message to big tech. We are not here to play games. If you want to do business on Australian shores, you will comply with Australian laws. And if you don't, you will face the consequences.

The Albanese Government is doubling down in our fight to keep under-16s off social media. We will double the penalty for non-compliance to $99 million and we will strengthen the powers of the eSafety Commissioner to hold social media companies to account. The Albanese Government is on the side of families and kids and we will continue to back them through these world-leading laws. Does anyone have any questions?

JOURNALIST: Minister, you'll need the support of either the Coalition or the Greens to get these new laws through the Senate - are you confident that you'll have support of either of those parties?

WELLS: Well, we were lucky to have the bipartisan support of the Coalition when we brought in the world-leading laws in the first place and we look to them to continue that bipartisan support for this next tranche. I would like to think that it is universally acceptable that we do what we can to improve laws where we have evidence to improve laws.

JOURNALIST: Minister, plenty of experts when you passed the first lot of laws on this warned that this was going to happen, warned there were plenty of ways that kids could get around, warned that there were holes in the enforcement provisions. Why were these issues that you're now addressing not addressed then when those warnings were first asked?

WELLS: Firstly, as the Comms Minister I take advice from the eSafety Commissioner. I had an update with you all in the Blue Room downstairs for the 31 March compliance update, and I made very clear in that press conference that I wasn't happy and I thought that they were taking the mickey. We gave them the opportunity to respond, we gave them the opportunity to improve. I get monthly reports from the eSafety Commissioner, we've now had two more of those through. We're not satisfied that they're making the progress we want to see, so now we're acting with this two-pronged approach, doubling the fines and enhancing the eSafety Commissioner's powers.

JOURNALIST: Is it an admission that it hasn't worked how you thought it was going to work?

WELLS: I have always said that I think this would look untidy, as modern parenting does, on the way through, and I've always said that my expectation is that the first three years of this will look untidy because it is always going to be more difficult when you are taking something away from under-16s who have already had social media accounts for some time, and that my thoughts are on the nine-year-olds and the five-year-olds that now will never have a social media account until they turn 16. That cultural change takes a while to come through. You might also have seen in YouGov research last week, I think or recently, 30 per cent of 13 to 15 year olds are now spending more time playing sport, 27 per cent are reporting better sleep, online bullying is down 9 per cent and exposure to inappropriate and violent crimes online has fallen 18 per cent. Imagine if the platforms fully complied. This is all part of the cultural change that we're working on but with the eSafety Commissioner we've now identified two different things that we can do to improve the laws and to enforce compliance so that's what we're going to do.

JOURNALIST: Minister, other countries have also said they are either legislating or discussing bringing in similar bans. Does that make your role easier when it comes to dealing with the big tech companies?

WELLS: Yes, we always welcome allies to the fight and we were very pleased when UK joined that fight last week or the week before. I think one of the reasons why we are seeing this bare minimum approach from big tech in Australia is that they want these laws to fail, because they want to be able to point to them to tell other countries not to bother. We did always expect that - and you heard me say that in the run-up to 10 December - that we know that big tech wants this to fail, and they would want reporting of anything that shows that these laws aren't working to 100 per cent efficacy. But honestly, what law does work to 100 per cent efficacy? This is about a really important cultural change, which is already underway.

JOURNALIST: Minister, a lot of experts have said, and the Greens included, say that a lot of these laws miss the broader issue, which is on restructuring algorithms to not be so addictive. Is that something the Government is considering?

WELLS: It is. It's part of the consideration around Digital Duty of Care, which you know that I've been working on, and it's about switching to a footing of safety by design, where big tech needs to make sure that they are looking after their customers in the first place and protecting them from online harm as part of safety by design, rather than the harm occurring, and there being avenues for recourse for the people that have suffered harm. So we are looking at algorithms, a number of different US states have now taken on different pieces of legislation that address algorithms. I think it's important that we do do that, but we are currently consulting and taking feedback from everybody about what exactly it should look like and how it should work.

JOURNALIST: We haven’t seen a fine yet and you're doubling it. So are you expecting fines to be handed out now?

WELLS: You’ll recall, in the 31 March compliance update, I said this isn't a case of pointing a speeding radar at a car and issuing a fine on the spot. These are the biggest, richest, most resourced companies in the world and, when the eSafety Commissioner heads to the Federal Court, she needs to make sure that she's got a good case and that she has all the documents that she needs in order to get this done. So the enhancements of the enforcement powers that we are announcing today gives her the ability to recover and request documents that she doesn't currently have. An example of that would be age assurance companies that big tech are using would now be required to provide documents from their work to the eSafety Commissioner, which means that she doesn't just have to rely on what these big tech companies are saying to her, she can compel them.

JOURNALIST: Do you expect to see fines levied this year?

WELLS: It's not a question for me. You'll remember I’ve said if it was up to me I would have been ready to fine about 17th of December. It's for the eSafety Commissioner as our independent regulator to make that decision. My job as a lawmaker is to make sure that the laws are as best as I can make them to give her the ability to be successful when she does.

JOURNALIST: So her advice to you is that if she receives these new powers, she will be able to penalise these companies?

WELLS: I think her advice to me is that the ability to compel production of documents would greatly improve her ability to enforce this influence.

JOURNALIST: Minister, with your sports responsibilities, how would you feel if a Socceroo player punched an opponent… and what message does it send to when a Labor MP has done that?        

WELLS: The same way that I get asked regularly about the conduct of Australian athletes and players both on and off the field, I say the same thing that I do when I'm asked about that from any other player, be it a Socceroo or else, which is that if you do the crime, you suffer the consequences. You should apologise. In this case, Josh has done that.

JOURNALIST: Did he do it quickly enough and with enough sincerity?

WELLS: I have absolutely no opinion on that. I just think that's a silly line of questioning.

JOURNALIST: Minister, in recent months, there's been a surge of foreign content-making farms based in South-East Asia, making money off One Nation memes and AI-generated misinformation, focusing on One Nation. Does that concern you? And is there anything the Government can do to ask Facebook to look into these accounts that are profiting on spreading misinformation and AI-generated memes in Australia?

WELLS: I would say as the Comms Minister, I've been keeping a careful eye on what this is doing to public discourse in Australia. We know that big tech platforms, social media platforms, at the end of the day are there to generate as much revenue as they possibly can for their shareholders. The way they do that is through advertising revenue, and the way that they generate advertising revenue is through maximising engagement, and the way that they maximise engagement is through outrage. Mark Zuckerberg has said that himself in various court testimony that he is now subject to in the States. So I think the way that we are seeing that play out in public discourse in Australia is a sense from everyday Australians that the internet has gotten more angry, the internet has gotten more outrageous, the internet has gotten more aggressive. I think that's attributable to what I just set out for you. So I think the public policy question I need to answer is what can we do to try and keep Australians safe online, kids in particular. The Digital Duty of Care - that means that big tech platforms themselves need to protect people from harm before allowing them on their platforms and to make sure that their platforms are safe by design. We'll address that from a public policy perspective.

JOURNALIST: But that kind of meme farm, people sitting in an office in Jakarta creating outrage clickbait, isn't that tantamount essentially to foreign interference? It's a way of destabilising democracy, isn't it?

WELLS: I think it speaks to the question earlier about international allies. Obviously the internet is a porous place. It doesn't stop at different jurisdictions. So every country we have, the dozen that have already joined us in making strides to try and regulate the internet to make it safer for kids, makes it easier for us to try and make good public policy answers to these very tricky and pressing questions about it.

JOURNALIST: On the $99 million fine, are you sure it's enough of a disincentive for big tech companies in order to play ball? And are there potential other things that might happen down the road like platform geo-blocking for companies that continue to repeat offend?

WELLS: The $99 million is equivalent to other breaches of law in Australian jurisdiction. That's what we need to go off, we don't summon the figure out of thin air. I think this also goes to the reputational question and that's the feedback I've certainly gotten from platforms when I've met with them. At the end of the day, they don't want to be seen as a company that disregards local law, and a company that is happy to operate and provide an unsafe environment. It goes to their reputational question.

I also think back in the day when seatbelts became mandatory, there was an outcry about this wouldn't be effective, people wouldn't observe it. That probably was the case, that people weren't observing the seatbelt rules and there was a cultural change around that. But at the time, there were people that said this would end the automotive industry, but now we see that car manufacturers compete on a safety record and Volvo competes with the safest car harness for your child. I think that these laws and these reforms that we're making now, of course they're going to look untidy on the way through, but they are a steady beat of the drum towards changing the culture around online safety so that ultimately these big tech platforms compete to be the safest platform for your child.

JOURNALIST: It’s been three years since the landmark Murphy report was handed down, are you confident the Government has met those findings, or those recommendations, when you're looking at this gambling reform legislation potentially heading through the House of Reps this week?

WELLS: The reform package that the Prime Minister announced at the National Press Club is the most significant wave of reforms in gambling reforms since the last wave that he announced with Minister Rowland in the first term. We consider that to be a priority of the Government, we'll have more to say on that shortly and we are still working to the 1 January timeline that we announced for implementation.

JOURNALIST: Just back on social media, when the UK announced their laws earlier this month, they said they would actually go further than Australia had gone and they were going to look to prevent children from accessing live streaming and chat functions on gaming platforms, for example, with strangers. Is that something that the Government is open to considering down the line?

WELLS: I met with Kanishka Narayan, who is one of my two counterparts from the UK, when he was over here. I’m still in contact with him because we can and should work together in this space. They’re calling their reforms Australia-plus and good on them. It’s flattering, but in some ways we already have in hand some of the things that they’re saying. So AI chatbots for example, we already have on foot with industry codes. AI chatbots will be captured by Digital Duty of Care. So I think we should all just continue to work together, use the latest research and collaborate on trying to put up a stronger barrier to keep kids safe online.

JOURNALIST: Minister, just a final point on the Socceroos, are you planning to visit or travel to the World Cup at all?

WELLS: No, their next game’s 4am Saturday morning so I will be here in Australia after another sitting week.

JOURNALIST: Has the Prime Minister requested that you not attend the World Cup?

WELLS: No.