Annex A: An indicative timeline

  • Pre-legislative scrutiny (12 weeks, likely to start June 2021 with a gap for recess)
  • Bill introduced in the autumn 2021 (passage may take up to 9 months)
  • Commencement and Royal Assent outlining definitions and basic powers of OFCOM (earliest summer 2022)
  • First big showpiece will be the Secretary of State setting out their priorities (some will come from OFCOM).
  • OFCOM set out Section 61 risk assessment which will encompass the big systemic issues, design of platform and content. This may take 6 months but can take up to 18 months. OFCOM will then need to produce Section 62 guidance to providers on how they should carry out risk assessment (a further 6 months).
  • Only when guidance on risk assessment is published are platforms obliged to undertake the risk assessments. Providers have 3 months to do the risk assessment, but extra time can be agreed by OFCOM.
  • OFCOM also has to produce guidance on assessment of access by children, which will be interlocking but developed as a standalone process.
  • Sometime around this time the Secretary of State can bring in regulations via secondary legislation not covered by the rest of the regime.
  • Prior to doing that (though exact timings are unclear), OFCOM has to deliver Section 5 – advice on the tiers (Cat 1, 2a, 2b etc).
  • OFCOM is very good at delivering robust processes, but may take 6 months to a year to get up and running. The shortest possible path is 9 months (though this feels unfeasible in reality).
  • Overall looking at mid-2023, recognising that a number of issues will be contested.