The Government introduced its long promised law to keep under 16s off social media on Monday, and within hours both of its coalition partners had confirmed they will vote against it. The Prime Minister then conceded the bill will not even reach a first reading before this Parliament ends.
The Online Safety (Minimum Age and Child Safety Risk Assessment) Bill would require what the Government calls high risk platforms to take reasonable steps to check that their users are over 16. Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, YouTube, X and Facebook are all named. The reasonable steps allowed include using account information the platform already holds, facial age estimation, digital ID services and formal identification.
Education Minister Erica Stanford, who was handed the job of leading the work, said the bill aims at the companies rather than at families. “The bill places legal obligations on platforms. No penalties are proposed for children, their parents or caregivers,” Stanford said, in remarks reported by RNZ.
“It doesn’t just introduce a minimum age requirement. It creates an enduring framework that can evolve alongside technology and holds platforms responsible for understanding and reducing the risks they create for children,” Stanford said.
Alongside the age check, platforms would have to regularly assess the risks they create and report on how those risks are being reduced. A factsheet released with the bill lists illegal content, harmful content such as grooming, cyberbullying, harassment and AI deepfakes, advertising and behavioural profiling, and the design of the services themselves. A new regulator inside the Department of Internal Affairs would monitor and enforce compliance, with powers running from gathering information and auditing the age checking technology all the way up to geo blocking a platform or pursuing criminal penalties.
The headline sanction is a fine of up to 10 percent of a company’s global revenue. Messaging apps such as WhatsApp and Discord are outside the bill, as are online games like Roblox. AI chatbots used mainly for productivity, such as ChatGPT and Gemini, are also out of scope, although social AI companions are covered. There is no ban on virtual private networks in the legislation, despite months of speculation that one was coming.
None of that detail settles the question that matters most, which is whether the bill can ever become law. ACT and New Zealand First have invoked the agree to disagree clause in their coalition agreements, which frees them to oppose a Government bill in the House. That leaves National needing Labour’s votes simply to get the bill past its first reading, and Labour has not given them.
ACT leader David Seymour said protecting children online was a serious problem but that National had reached for the wrong tool. “The National Party wanted to put this out before the election. It’s their right, I wish them luck, but the country does need a more serious solution to this problem,” he said.
Seymour was scathing about the size of the proposed fines. “You just have to look at the idea that the New Zealand government is going to fine a company like Meta 10 percent of its global revenue. That would be $33 billion, which would be great, I mean, the government would be in a massive surplus, but I don’t think they’re going to pay, and that small fact alone shows this is not a serious solution.”
Stanford disagreed, arguing that acting at the same time as other countries is what gives the penalty its bite. “They don’t give a damn about our kids, and they will pay, which is why it was so important to have that percentage of global profits, and we are in lockstep with other countries on that,” she said.
New Zealand First leader Winston Peters called an unscheduled media conference at Parliament to object to the bill being described as a Government measure at all. “To call it a government bill is a falsity,” he said. “It is from the National Party, and that should have been explained to you.” Peters said he would be asking how much public money had gone into the legislation and the promotion around it, and warned that age checking would cost New Zealanders “all sorts of freedoms” through digital ID.
Labour is not committing either. Its science and technology spokesperson Reuben Davidson wrote to Stanford on Friday with a list of 79 matters the party wants addressed first, including how much consultation there had been with young people, how a platform would actually demonstrate it had complied, whether a full privacy impact assessment would be published, and how the penalties would be enforced. “I want to be clear that we take this legislation very seriously,” Davidson wrote. Labour leader Chris Hipkins said the party had not yet heard back and would “just continue to engage with them in good faith on it”.
The Greens object on different grounds. Media and communications spokesperson HΕ«hana Lyndon said an age limit leaves the underlying business model untouched. “We need to regulate social media platforms for all users so these platforms are free from harmful content, rather than just trying to limit access for young people while others continue to engage with harmful algorithms,” she said.
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon defended pressing on without the numbers, saying parents and principals had told him plainly that they wanted an intervention. “One in three children aged between 13 and 17 are now spending at least five hours on social media a day,” he told 1News. “Social media is exposing them to harmful content, addictive technology and pressures they are not equipped to deal with and it’s affecting their family life, mental health, sleep, and education.”
He also acknowledged the timing problem. “That’ll be something we have to pick up on the other side of the election, but I hope that many other parties will look at the bill and say ‘that’s a really sensible proposal.’”
The calendar explains why. According to Parliament’s own election timeline, the House adjourns for the final time on 24 September, Parliament is dissolved on 1 October and the country votes on 7 November. That leaves about a month of sitting time for a bill whose sponsor has already said it will not get a first reading in it.
This is the second time the idea has stalled short of the House floor. National MP Catherine Wedd first put an under 16 ban forward as a member’s bill in May 2025, modelled on Australia’s law. It was drawn from the ballot that October, and a select committee inquiry that took 430 submissions recommended an age restriction in December 2025. Work on it was paused in May 2026 once it became clear the coalition numbers were not there.
What has been introduced, then, is less a law in progress than a policy on the table for the campaign. Voters get to see the text, the parties have stated their positions, and the decision passes to the election. Anyone weighing up where the parties stand on this and other issues can compare them using our voting tool.
Should New Zealand keep under 16s off social media, and would fining the platforms actually work? Leave a comment below and tell us what you think.
This article was written by AI, briefed to report the facts, hopefully without some of the bias people bring to the job π
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