Foreign aid slashed to fund it.

Starmer says it will be funded by "extremely difficult and painful choices".

Overseas aid will be slashed from 0.5% to 0.3% of GNI in 2 years.

Says asylum backlogs and hotel costs in UK (come from aid budget) are going down but it is a cut.

Words from Ellen Roome are read to MPs:
“When a child has died, who are we protecting? Predators? The social media? If it was your child, you would want answers too.”

Lola McEvoy MP said a 100-word amendment to online safety laws could give this data to parents, and ensure a coroner is told whenever a child commits suicide or their death is unexplained, to request it from tech companies automatically.

Lib Dem MP Caroline Voaden says:

“Who is going to press charges against a global tech company for helping a bereaved mother? .. it’s a pathetic attempt to avoid bad publicity.”

Labour MP Lewis Atkinson says the social media companies have been “minimising and covering up evidence” - and apply privacy laws inconsistently.

He says they should “reflect on the injustice of this situation” - and find a way to do the right thing.

In Australia, the tech companies will have a year to implement it and decide how to do age verification - whether it relies on photo analysis (controversial) or uploading ID, which not every child has.

It's a test case being closely watched here.

But it's clear pressure is building. The Smartphone Free Childhood campaign is taking off.

A You Gov poll last week found 72% of adults would strongly or somewhat support a social media ban for under 16s, but only 32% thought it would be effective.

yougov.co.uk/topics/techn...

Children's charities such as the NSPCC are against a full ban, saying it would punish children, and ignores the benefits of online communities, including for children who are vulnerable.

www.nspcc.org.uk/about-us/new...

Other countries are also bringing in tougher measures - France has raised the age for social media accounts from 13 to 15 and is encouraging the EU to follow suit.

Denmark and Norway are also looking at age 15.

Tech secretary Peter Kyle is considering backing a private members bill by Labour MP & former teacher Josh McAllister which would prevent 13-16-year-olds giving their data to social media companies - so they can't be bombarded with addictive content via algorithms.

It's not proposing a full ban.

Then you have parents like Stuart Stephens, whose son Olly, 13, was murdered by other teenagers in 2021 in what was dubbed a "social media murder".

He told me: "I firmly believe that I lost my son because of weak governance and poor legislation, full stop..."

I was struck by how many parents are worried about the pressure to give their child a smartphone at the age of 11 when they start secondary school, or risk them being left out or bullied.

Some told us they want the government to help them with tougher restrictions in schools and outside.

Parliament deeply divided. Majority of 55.

This thorny issue is going to have a lot more debate in the coming months, but this is a line crossed.

A strange spectacle here as winding up speeches by the opposition and the government - Kieran Mullan and Alex Davies-Jones - do not express a view on this difficult issue but highlight some of the most powerful interventions on both sides.

Jessico Asato MP raises the issue that this could be misused as part of coercive control & domestic violence.

She said judges are not trained to spot this, and that of the 130 women a year murdered by a partner or relative, it's estimated half their deaths are recorded as suicide or an accident.

"Today I find myself voting in a way that I thought I never would."

V powerful from disabled MP Marie Tidball, in favour, who remembers telling her parents during surgery as a child "Please let me die."

She believes the bill is tightly drawn, but wants the language tightened up around coercion.

Health sec Wes Streeting who opposes the bill gives sympathetic smile to Rachel Maskell, as she argues palliative care fails too many people.

"We must give my right hon. friend the health secretary, after Lord Darzi's devastating report, the opportunity to reset health and care", she says.

First MP to say they've changed their mind is Andrew Mitchell - who wound up the debate against it in 2015.

He's now in favour and says it's important to note that assisted available or being discussed in many other jurisdictions giving 300million people this choice.

Labour's Mary Foy, who is voting against, makes powerful point about her daughter Maria who was disabled, and she says repeatedly given six months to live, but lived 27 years.

She was non-verbal and the MP says she fears for those who don't have someone to advocate for them.