Social Media
Dail Éireann — 2026-03-03
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Joanna Byrne (SF), Louth

The Minister will understand our confusion this evening. According to media reports, he was blindsided by the Government's announcement of the national digital and AI strategy 2030 last week. Just the day before that announcement, media sources were briefed that the under-16s' social media ban had been approved and that the strategy would be rolled out the following day. The media further stated that the Minister was surprised by the plan to work at EU level and that he was not aware of it, despite being the Minister responsible.
We are really just looking for a bit of clarity here, after months of press statements starting in May of last year when the Tánaiste announced the Government was looking at copying the Australian model that banned all under-16s from social media. There has been a lot of kite-flying, there has been a lot of media coverage and what we seem to have now is an ambiguous Government statement about working actively with like-minded EU member states to explore options on introducing age restrictions on the use of social media, concentrating in particular on those under 16. In his response, the Minister said the strategy states that the Government will take action if necessary. I am still unclear as to the concrete pathway on which we are moving forward with this.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-03-03/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-14T01:01:02+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-03-03