§ 1. Mr. LuffTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what meetings he has held with the publishers of magazines for teenage girls to discuss a code of conduct for their publications; and if he will make a statement. [18982]
§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Tom Sackville)I recently met representatives of magazine publishers and retailers to discuss the widely expressed concerns about the suitability for young people of the material contained in some magazines for teenage girls.
1090 The publishers and retailers agreed to set up a working party which would draw up guidelines to deal with this problem. I look forward to receiving its proposals.
§ Mr. LuffOn a day when the innocence of childhood is inevitably at the forefront of all our minds, may I thank my hon. Friend sincerely for the robust and tough position that he has taken in discussions with the publishers? May I urge him to continue in that vein? Does he agree that their claims merely to be offering information to young teenage girls are, at best, disingenuous, and that in reality they are using sex to boost sales?
§ Mr. SackvilleI thank my hon. Friend for what he said. The more that I have learnt about the subject since he introduced the Periodicals (Protection of Children) Bill, the more I have realised that, whatever agony aunts and others may say, the material in question is not merely a sex education service. Sex is being used to make money, unfortunately in this instance at the expense of the innocence of children and young people. I think that my hon. Friend did us all a service in introducing his Bill and highlighting another area in which standards of public decency and morality are falling.