The Verdict: Your views on the hottest topics of the week

National World - Broadcast Video

Our reporters hit the streets to talk to the public in our major cities across the UK about the news making the headlines this week. In this episode, we look at social media and children, Brexit four-years on, and what you'd most like to ban

Transcript

00:00 [MUSIC PLAYING]

00:03 Welcome to The Verdict on the Street, the show that

00:14 listens to its audience.

00:17 We're going to take some of the hottest topics

00:19 out onto the streets of Britain to ask you

00:22 what you think of them.

00:24 In a world that seems full of experts,

00:26 sometimes it's the opinions of the people on the street

00:29 that really matter.

00:30 So, great British public, it's over to you.

00:35 We send our reporters out into a number of cities across the UK,

00:38 armed only with a camera and a microphone

00:40 to ask simply, what do you think?

00:42 Here's what's coming up on this week's agenda.

00:48 Should social media apps or even smartphones

00:50 be restricted for anyone under 16?

00:53 This month marks the fourth anniversary of Brexit.

00:56 Do you think it's been a success?

00:58 And January has been a busy month for banning things.

01:01 What should we outlaw next?

01:02 But we kick off this week with concern

01:08 over young people and social media

01:10 after the shocking murder of teenager Brianna Gay.

01:13 Her mother, Esther, has said that the Online Safety Act does

01:16 not go far enough to protect children

01:18 and has called for smartphones and social media apps

01:20 to be banned from anyone under 16.

01:23 She said smartphone companies have a moral responsibility

01:26 to protect young people from the dangers of the internet,

01:28 and should not just be focused on profit.

01:31 The act became law in October 2023

01:34 with the aim of making the internet safer for children.

01:36 But as young people seem increasingly

01:38 addicted to their phones, where they can access

01:40 a wealth of harmful content, are they doing enough?

01:43 The internet's going to be the Wild West no matter what it is.

01:48 It shouldn't be regulated, but you

01:49 can educate to make sure people are a lot more strong

01:51 and resilient about all that kind of behaviour.

01:53 Online abuse is horrible, but we need

01:55 to focus more on mental health services for young people,

01:59 not just try and put in some sort of block bunch of laws

02:02 to try and regulate the internet.

02:04 It's not going to work.

02:05 They should ban social media for 16-year-olds and under.

02:10 I think it's really bad, because we don't know what they're doing

02:12 in the schools or when they're out with their friends.

02:15 We don't know.

02:16 They just keep themselves to themselves.

02:18 They lock themselves in the room,

02:19 and we don't know what they're doing on the laptop

02:22 or whatever.

02:23 I blame the parents on this.

02:25 If I was of that age, no way would a child have a smartphone.

02:30 I think it's very dangerous, because there's

02:33 some awful things and awful people out there.

02:36 And these children are absolutely amazing.

02:40 They run rings around their parents.

02:42 They know how to use these things.

02:45 16-year-old Brianna Jai was brutally

02:47 murdered in a premeditated attack by two teenagers.

02:51 During the investigation, it was found

02:52 that one of her killers, Scarlett Jenkinson,

02:54 had watched videos of torture and murder online.

02:57 Brianna's mother, Esther Jai, has

02:59 said her daughter accessed pro-anorexia and self-harm

03:02 material online before her death.

03:05 Now she wants social media use for teenagers restricted

03:08 and has called for searches for inappropriate material

03:11 to be flagged to parents.

03:12 Do you think young people's access to the internet

03:15 needs to be more closely monitored?

03:17 People walk down the road with them driving cars,

03:19 looking at phones, crossing the road, et cetera, et cetera.

03:23 But I do believe under 16-year-olds should be

03:26 limited, but as I said, a lot of grown-ups

03:29 can't even show any responsibility.

03:31 So how can you expect children to as well?

03:33 When they turn 18, when the kids turn 18, or at least 16,

03:36 that gives a better understanding.

03:37 But the thing is, still, when you turn 16,

03:40 it's a bit of a problem.

03:41 So I think it should be 18 and 16,

03:43 because there's a lot of content which is bad.

03:46 And personally, I used it when I was 18.

03:48 I don't think it's got anything to do with it.

03:50 I'm sorry to disagree with the mother there,

03:52 but no, I mean, the sooner you start them

03:59 on modern society communication, I think, the better.

04:04 I don't know.

04:05 Since I haven't had a smartphone,

04:07 it's been nice to be a lot easier.

04:08 So I don't know about kids.

04:10 I mean, I hear a lot about it in the media.

04:13 I leave it to the parents to decide this.

04:16 I'm not a parent, and I go, yeah.

04:18 I mean, there's children as young as eight and nine-year-old

04:21 using social media.

04:23 And I think that's wrong.

04:24 I think they should monitor it a lot more than they do.

04:28 Social media apps under 16s, I thought

04:31 they were banned already, or under 16s

04:34 who weren't able to use social media apps.

04:37 Yeah, it seems like to be very young to be using,

04:41 to be exposed on social media, which is unregulated

04:44 at the moment.

04:44 [MUSIC PLAYING]

04:48 Next, we travel back to 2016.

04:50 And you'll remember Boris on his bus

04:52 and the host of other politicians and Brexiteers

04:54 making promises that sounded too good to be true.

04:58 350 million pounds a week for the NHS, frictionless trade,

05:02 and new deals around the world, taking back

05:04 control of immigration and ending the supremacy

05:07 of those pesky EU laws.

05:09 But you might be forgiven for thinking

05:11 that the whole process hasn't been

05:12 as smooth and beneficial to our country after the Brexit

05:15 was over, and that the EU was a failure.

05:18 But it hasn't been as smooth and beneficial to our country

05:21 after all.

05:22 So after four turbulent years, has Brexit

05:25 been everything you hoped it would be,

05:27 or the disaster you expected?

05:31 It's been four years since the UK left the EU.

05:35 Has Brexit been a success, would you say?

05:40 The only time we hear about Brexit

05:42 now is if there isn't things on the shelves,

05:45 things on the shelves again.

05:46 But the only time in the past few months

05:48 I've heard people talk about Brexit is charges.

05:51 Me friends from different countries

05:53 who also have really good jobs where they could be helping

05:56 now can't come back into the country.

05:58 And that's a real strain on resources,

06:01 not just because of me friends.

06:03 Genuinely, some of the people who now can't come and live

06:05 here who lived here before, they would

06:07 have been like an asset to the country.

06:10 But now they would have to do so much to come here.

06:12 The only time I ever hear anything to do with Brexit

06:14 is really negative.

06:16 So I don't think it's been a success for anyone.

06:18 So I voted against Brexit anyway.

06:21 So no, I wouldn't vote differently.

06:24 Do I think it's been a success?

06:25 No.

06:25 Do I think it's been the disaster predicted?

06:27 Probably no.

06:29 But I think you just get on with it and make what it is now.

06:31 It is what it is.

06:32 And you've just got to make the best of it.

06:34 So I voted to stay in the EU.

06:36 And I think it was a very rash move

06:38 to make to come out the EU.

06:39 We didn't need to come out.

06:40 It was racially motivated.

06:41 People like Anne Whittacombe pushed it.

06:43 And she's not a very nice woman.

06:45 So I'm very pro-EU.

06:48 I know it's very political.

06:49 But I'm pro-EU, pro-Brussels, pro-Europe, not Brexit.

06:53 Brexit's racist, in my opinion.

06:55 Brexit's been an unmitigated failure,

06:58 because it's been designed to be a failure.

07:02 It was a weak government has caused this.

07:06 So no, I voted to leave the European Union.

07:11 And I would vote twice to vote the European Union today.

07:15 Well, I think it's all false promises.

07:19 I think they said they're going to sort the country out.

07:22 It seems to be for more politicians that are voting,

07:25 I think, to try and get the vote in.

07:27 As a scientist, it's been devastating.

07:30 Half of our European colleagues left.

07:33 We don't get the same numbers of people coming over.

07:36 Pretty much all of my European colleagues

07:38 left within the last five years.

07:40 It's been bad.

07:42 And we've lost funding.

07:44 And it's as simple as that.

07:45 I don't think we're going to remain competitive.

07:48 My opinion on Brexit hasn't changed.

07:50 To leave or remain, do you know what I mean?

07:52 But I think my opinion on the different--

07:55 on Parliament and the different conservatives and Labour,

07:58 that's definitely changed.

08:01 I think conservatives-- I used to be

08:04 a big fan of the conservatives.

08:06 And that has definitely changed in the past 12 to 18 months.

08:10 I think it's just lies after lies, especially

08:12 when it comes to Brexit.

08:14 There's a lot that they say that, no, you can't look back

08:17 and go, well, hang on a minute.

08:18 You said that to get people on side.

08:20 And it's definitely not true.

08:23 I didn't vote for Brexit.

08:24 No, I don't think it's been a success to.

08:26 No.

08:27 No, I think it's given us more problems than we

08:29 realised we were going to have.

08:35 January was a busy month for our government

08:36 and their desire to ban things.

08:38 We had legislation on zombie-style knives

08:40 and machetes, disposable vapes, and ex-held bully dogs.

08:44 But why stop there?

08:45 What else should we be getting rid of?

08:46 People smoking in public.

08:52 No, I think it's really bad because, I mean,

08:54 not everybody can take the smoke, right?

08:58 And they should ban them on the buses as well.

09:01 You get-- I mean, during COVID, the number of people

09:03 I saw coughing and spitting in the streets.

09:06 And I tried to say to some fella, you know,

09:10 there's COVID going around and you're spitting.

09:13 The amount of rubbish there is as well, I don't like that.

09:17 Yeah.

09:17 On the estate I live on, the edges of the road

09:21 are absolutely full of rubbish.

09:23 So, yeah.

09:25 I've bred gundogs in my younger days.

09:28 As I said, I'm not politically correct.

09:31 I hunt and I shoot.

09:33 Now, I've always come to conclusion, most of the time,

09:36 there's no such thing as a bad dog, but a bad owner.

09:40 It's the way you treat a dog, the way you look after the dog,

09:44 the way you bring it on.

09:46 Puppies are like children.

09:48 You've got to play with them and you've got to train them.

09:52 And we're going back to kids with mobile phones.

09:55 Half the time, these children aren't trained.

09:59 From ex-held bully dogs to some types of vape

10:02 and even bagpipes at the upcoming Euros.

10:05 It's certainly been a year for things being banned.

10:08 In light of this, we've sent camera teams out

10:11 across the country to find out what

10:13 irritations the great British public would like to see banned.

10:17 And here is a few more to add to the list.

10:20 I'll tell you one thing I would ban,

10:22 and as soon as you notice it, it's everywhere.

10:25 And it's people regarding chewing gum everywhere.

10:28 When you look on any street, there's little white marks

10:31 and that's people spitting chewing gum out on the street.

10:34 And it's disgusting and it's really bad.

10:36 Just recently, there's been a lot of knife crime around Leeds.

10:39 And it depends on the area you're looking at.

10:41 And the thing is, obviously Idris Elba,

10:44 just recently he was talking about tackling that knife crime.

10:47 And this is the biggest issue because the thing is,

10:50 people are getting killed every now and then.

10:52 And there's a surge in epidemic.

10:54 And obviously, there should be a reason as to why you need a knife.

10:57 For example, if you're working in a restaurant,

11:00 for example, if you're using it at home.

11:02 But the problem is, it's so easy for anyone to gain access to a knife

11:06 where digs should be considered.

11:08 Alcohol.

11:09 [laughs]

11:10 Yeah, excess amounts of alcohol.

11:12 I don't know, it seems like that is quite a big problem

11:16 for public health, isn't it?

11:17 You know, people, they get unwell when they drink more

11:19 and, you know, long-term kind of conditions linked to alcohol.

11:24 People making a nuisance of themselves in public houses.

11:29 So is that people getting too rowdy, too drunk, too loud, too leery?

11:32 Yes, yeah.

11:33 Or different issues.

11:37 You don't make them put a nuisance of yourselves in public houses?

11:40 No, no.

11:41 No.

11:42 Very well behaved.

11:43 Banning things doesn't necessarily fix anything.

11:45 It's all about making sure that we fund education services

11:49 and mental health services properly.

11:50 [music]

11:53 [music fades out]

11:55 [music fades out]

11:57 (upbeat music)

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