Claire Perry MP

Claire Perry, Conservative MP for Devizes and a former banker.

Contacts

E-mail: claire.perry.mp@parliament.uk Tel:01380 729358 Office: House of Commons, London SW1A 0AA

Internet Content Regulation

Claire Perry argues that children are finding it increasingly easy to access violent and shocking content on their home computers, while there is little adequate protection available to parents. In a debate in the House of Commons she states that the government has thrown up its hands and put this in the 'too-hard basket'. She believes it is something the government should regulate. She is a fervent advocate of default blocking of pornography.

In April 2012 she chaired an Independent Parliamentary Inquiry into Online Child Protection that concluded that ISPs should do more to keep children safe.

Along with Fiona Mactaggart MP, she has advocated the idea of an opt-in system for internet users.

"I do not believe in censoring material; I believe in responsibility and companies signing up to an agenda ... We took a lot of evidence and came up with the idea that an opt-in system is the best way to deliver protection. Each home would have a clean feed, using the same filtering technology as is used in device-level filters and in schools—the technology is simple and cheap—and people opt in to receive adult content. There would be choice, there would be no censorship and the material would still be available. That proposal was very popular, and almost two thirds of adults say they like the idea of opt-in technology.

A former banker and McKinsey analyst, Perry is also credited with encouraging TalkTalk to see the commercial benefits of offering families with young children an "opt-in" porn option. One of the smaller internet service providers (not accurate), TalkTalk recently announced that more than 350,000 customers were using its free HomeSafe service.

• Guardian profile, 2012-05-27

Appointment to advise Prime Minister on child sexualisation

“I am absolutely delighted that the Prime Minister has asked me to be his adviser on preventing the commercialisation and sexualisation of childhood. I am very much looking forward to helping the Government introduce more robust filters for internet content in our homes, working to improve age rating information on music videos, helping to improve education for parents and children about online safety and making sure the other excellent recommendations of the Bailey Report are implemented”.

Website

After her personal website was exploited, she described the action as having been "sponsored" by Guido Fawkes (the first website to mention the event). Paul Staines (the person behind the Guido Fawkes persona) threatened to send a letter threatening to sue for libel over the comment.

Links

• wikipedia:Claire Perry
• twitter:claire4devizes
• Claire Perry: a new breed of iron lady, Guardian profile, 2012-05-27