Scottish Minister for Children Siobhian Brown is due to meet the UK Minister for AI and Online Safety Kanishka Narayan on Sunday.
The Scottish Government has urged the UK Government to do “more to protect children and young people from online harm”.
Scottish Minister for Children, Siobhian Brown, is due to meet the UK Minister for AI and Online Safety Kanishka Narayan on Sunday.
Ms Brown said she would “call for urgent action to protect young people” during the meeting.
It comes amid widespread expectation that Sir Keir Starmer will announce a ban on under-16s being able to access harmful social media sites following the Government’s consultation on what restrictions should be introduced.
The consultation received around 116,000 responses, making it the second-largest government consultation in history after a consultation on equal marriage in 2012.
Speaking before the meeting, Ms Brown, Minister for Children, Young People and The Promise, said: “We need to do so much more to protect children and young people from online harm.
“We’ve been consistently pushing the UK Government to act, given the powers to control online safety are reserved to Westminster.
“One of my first acts as Minister was to write to the UK Government to push for urgent action, so I hope there will now finally be some substantive steps taken.
“We know there are steps that the UK Government could be taking now – from banning the use of social media for children and using Ofcom’s powers to force social media firms to act.”
An Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) survey of more than 2,000 adults, carried out over Wednesday and Thursday, found 51% trust parents to decide which platforms are appropriate, 49% trust an independent regulator, 22% trust schools, 16% trust technology companies and 15% trust government ministers.
The polling, conducted by YouGov, also found 44% support banning under-16s from social media, while 39% prefer tighter regulation.
Ms Brown added: “Scottish Ministers have been consistently clear that social media providers must be held to account and have a responsibility to properly enforce their own policies on harmful online content.
“I want to see, for example, the introduction of a Social Media Levy, charging social media platforms a fee which can be reinvested back into programmes for young people’s mental health.
“In Scotland, our aim is to tackle this issue as a public health matter, recognising that there is a spectrum of harm that can be caused from the absorption of hateful and harmful content and unhealthy use of online services.”
