Latest news with #SundayWithLauraKuenssberg
The Herald Scotland
a day ago
- Politics
- The Herald Scotland
Starmer focused on grooming victims not ‘grandstanding', says Reeves
After initially resisting pressure to implement a full probe, the Prime Minister said he had read 'every single word' of an independent report into child sexual exploitation by Baroness Louise Casey and would accept her recommendation for the investigation. Home Secretary Yvette Cooper is set to address Parliament on Monday about the findings of the review. Reform UK leader Nigel Farage described the move as a 'welcome U-turn', while Kemi Badenoch called on him to apologise for 'six wasted months'. Asked whether the Prime Minister had changed his mind about the idea of a national inquiry, the Chancellor told the Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg programme: 'I think Keir Starmer, our Prime Minister, has always been really focused, as he was when he was director of public prosecutions, on the victims and not grandstanding. 'But actually doing the practical things to ensure that something like this never happens again, but also to ensure that the victims of this horrific abuse over many, many years is got to grips with and that people have answers to their questions.' Earlier this year, the Government dismissed calls for a public inquiry, saying its focus was on putting in place the outstanding recommendations already made in a seven-year national inquiry by Professor Alexis Jay. Shadow chancellor Sir Mel Stride criticised the Government's 'very late' decision to launch the inquiry, and claimed it had only come after pressure from the Tories. Shadow chancellor of the Exchequer Mel Stride arrives at BBC Broadcasting House (James Manning/PA) Sir Mel told BBC One's Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg: 'It's a very late decision – it should have happened far, far earlier. 'We've been calling for this for many, many months.' He accused Sir Keir of previously dismissing concerns from senior Tory figures. 'Kemi Badenoch, Chris Philp and others have been derided by the Prime Minister for hopping on some kind of far-right bandwagon, dog-whistle politics and the rest of it,' Sir Mel said. 'That was the wrong response. This is just another example of the Prime Minister being pressurised by us into U-turning.' The inquiry will be able to compel witnesses to give evidence, and it is understood that it will be national in scope, co-ordinating a series of targeted local investigations. Baroness Louise Casey (Kirsty O'Connor/PA) Speaking to reporters travelling with him on his visit to Canada on Saturday, the Prime Minister said: 'I have never said we should not look again at any issue. 'I have wanted to be assured that on the question of any inquiry. 'That's why I asked Louise Casey who I hugely respect to do an audit. 'Her position when she started the audit was that there was not a real need for a national inquiry over and above what was going on. 'She has looked at the material she has looked at and she has come to the view that there should be a national inquiry on the basis of what she has seen. 'I have read every single word of her report and I am going to accept her recommendation. 'That is the right thing to do on the basis of what she has put in her audit.'
Yahoo
09-02-2025
- Yahoo
Parents suing TikTok over children's deaths ‘want answers'
Parents who are suing TikTok alleging the app was linked to their children's deaths 'want answers' and 'accountability'. Four bereaved British families have filed a lawsuit against the video-sharing platform in the US, and its parent firm ByteDance, over access to their children's social media accounts. They told the BBC's Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg programme that access could clarify what had led to the deaths, with one mother asking 'why hold back from giving us the data? How can they sleep at night?' The wrongful death lawsuit claims Isaac Kenevan, 13; Archie Battersbee, 12; Julian 'Jools' Sweeney, 14; and Maia Walsh, 13; all died from injuries suffered while taking part in online challenges in 2022. It accuses TikTok of pushing dangerous prank and challenge videos to children to boost engagement time on the platform. The families of Isaac, Archie, Jools and Maia are claiming their children died after doing a so-called 'blackout challenge' on TikTok. According to TikTok, it does not allow content showing or promoting dangerous activity or challenges, and it proactively finds 99% of content removed for breaking these rules before it is reported to the firm. During a group interview with a parent of each of the four children, Isaac's mother claimed the platform still allowed harmful content, including challenges. Lisa Kenevan told Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg that TikTok issued 'the same corporate statement every time' stories on the topic appeared in the media. 'It's an insult', she said, adding that the families were seeking 'accountability'. Her son's final video showed him laughing each time he passed out, she told the programme. 'He's been influenced by something or someone who has watched these challenges on TikTok', she said. March 8 2022 had been a 'very ordinary day', Ms Kenevan said. 'We came home, I was cooking dinner, he was upstairs, and he was a bit of a practical joker … when I called upstairs for dinner he didn't answer, so I didn't think that was unusual – then the third call to him I got desperate, and there was no answer,' she said. 'So I went running down the stairs, I got a hammer from the garage, I went running upstairs, bashed the door down and that's where I found Isaac, unconscious.' He died the following day. One of his videos 'had a TikTok emblem at the bottom' but police did not know if it had been posted to the site as they 'didn't search the history back any further', Ms Kenevan said. 'So I am left with, what did he do about those videos, were they posted?' When she let Isaac download the app during lockdown she said she had thought TikTok was 'safe' and 'fun', with users taking part in 'innocent challenges' including the 'bottle flip, the floss, (the) ice bucket challenge'. Maia's father said his daughter asked him to download TikTok and 'approximately six months from that point she's dead'. Liam Walsh described telling police 'I want her data scooped' about 15 minutes after first seeing her body 'because nothing else makes any sense into why this child should end up like this, nothing'. Mr Walsh told Laura Kuenssberg: 'I relied on that request from her deathbed, which is what it was, I relied on that and I was wrong – I was so, so wrong to rely on that.' Ellen Roome, mother of Jools, has been campaigning for 'Jools's Law' to give parents the right to access their children's online activity after they die. She told the BBC programme there were 'vast similarities about how all four children took their lives in a very similar way, and we all believe it's something to do with TikTok'. Ms Roome spoke after Maia's father had recounted his daughter's death, telling him: 'Hearing you speak, Liam, takes me straight back to that night'. 'I said to the detective that night, sitting there with Jools's body in between his dad and I – I said 'take Jools's phone and use facial recognition and set yourself a Pin''. She said officers told her they would not 'tamper' with the phone, but later could not gain access. Five months later, Jools's closest friend guessed his Pin by suggesting spelling out his name in numbers. But the data had been erased by then, Ms Roome said. Earlier in the programme, Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner was asked if she thought it was safe for children to be on TikTok in light of the family's lawsuit. She said: 'I worry about that, and my heart goes out to those families … I'm a mother myself, and when you hear about what happens and what children are subjected to and what they can see online, it is really dangerous. 'It's one of the reasons the online harms bill … which will come into effect in March, is so crucially important, because our children do need protecting from that.' US-based legal resource Social Media Victims Law Centre (SMVLC), for parents of children harmed by social media use, filed the lawsuit in Delaware on behalf of the families.
