back to article Wannabe Prime Minister Andrea Leadsom thinks all websites should be rated – just like movies

The UK's possible future prime minister thinks all websites should be classified with minimum age ratings, just like films. Andrea Leadsom is one of two candidates left in the race for the leadership of the Conservative Party; the winner of which will become the country's Prime Minister. Although many are concerned with the …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Andrea Leadsom...

    Rated for what? Political Bias?

    So when it comes to censorship, probably slightly less draconian than Theresa May then.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Andrea Leadsom...

      To me they both look like worthy successors to one of the greatest female leaders this country has ever had.

      That said you are right this is a difficult choice, on the one hand Theresa May has the experience on the other Andrea Leadsom has clearly indicated she is in tune with the will of the people.

      1. This post has been deleted by its author

        1. phuzz Silver badge
          Facepalm

          Re: Andrea Leadsom...

          @ Symon I'm pretty sure* that Titus is being a mite sarcastic and is comparing Theresa May to Maggie Thatcher.

          Which is ridiculous because Maggie at least understood basic science.

          * Well, I hope so

          1. Loyal Commenter Silver badge

            Re: Andrea Leadsom...

            Which is ridiculous because Maggie at least understood basic science.

            * Well, I hope so

            Given that she had a biochemistry degree, yes...

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: Andrea Leadsom...

              Which is ridiculous .... she had a biochemistry degree, yes...

              Which she put to good use in helping to invent "Mr Whippy".

              1. hplasm
                Happy

                Re: Andrea Leadsom...

                "Which she put to good use in helping to invent "Mr Whippy"."

                Douglas Hurd?

              2. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: Andrea Leadsom...

                > Which she put to good use in helping to invent "Mr Whippy".

                I thought there were other conservative MPs involved in that sort of activity...

              3. Leslie Graham

                Re: Andrea Leadsom...

                And spent the rest of the time engineering an unmitigated cultural and economic disaster from which the UK has never recovered. Not to mention she lost The Falklands through sheer incompetence which lead to the loss of hundreds of lives in order to get it back.

                Worst PM in UK history.

                1. Anonymous Coward
                  Anonymous Coward

                  Re: Andrea Leadsom... @Leslie

                  You say that but one thing she did not do was hold a referendum on EEC membership.

            2. Hollerithevo

              Re: Andrea Leadsom...

              She always said "I am proud to be Britain's first Prime Minister who is a ...chemist."

              1. hplasm
                Devil

                Re: Andrea Leadsom...

                She always said "I am proud to be Britain's first Prime Minister who is a ...chemist."

                (Jack) Boots?

            3. Starting

              Re: Andrea Leadsom...

              Chemistry degree, not Biochemistry. (Just so we keep things accurate.)

            4. Starting
              Alert

              Re: Andrea Leadsom...

              Chemistry degree, not Biochemistry. (Just so we keep things accurate.)

          2. inmypjs Silver badge

            Re: Andrea Leadsom...

            "@ Symon I'm pretty sure* that Titus is being a mite sarcastic and is comparing Theresa May to Maggie Thatcher."

            Really? I thought he meant Cameron - behaved like an effing girl to the very end.

            1. This post has been deleted by its author

              1. MiguelC Silver badge

                Re: About 26 MPs have a STEM degree

                Do you mean roughly between 25.8 and 26.3 MPs?

              2. Mark 85
                Happy

                Re: Andrea Leadsom...

                Maybe we could replace the "House of Lords" with a "House of Labs",

                For a moment there I had a vision of Parliament filled with Retrievers and wanting to play "fetch". It put a smile on this old face of mine.

                1. Crazy Operations Guy

                  Re: Andrea Leadsom...

                  > Maybe we could replace the "House of Lords" with a "House of Labs"

                  I hope some kind of Astrophysics Lab where scientist can study how its possible for the lords' heads to be so dense, but not exhibit any gravitational effects or collapse in upon itself and become a neutron star.

                  It does seem like a mistake to hand so much power to people whose only qualification is "My daddy was a lord that didn't pull out"

                  1. Anonymous Coward
                    Anonymous Coward

                    Re: Andrea Leadsom...

                    "It does seem like a mistake to hand so much power to people whose only qualification is "My daddy was a lord that didn't pull out""

                    It is many years since the House of Lords was purged of many of the inherited positions. The vast majority are Life Peers (683). While some were political rewards - others could be considered experts in their non-political field. Even political appointees have often chosen to become cross-benchers - so as to follow their consciences rather than their previous party's line.

                    There are now very few hereditary peers (89). The vacancies in their ranks are filled by voting by the House of Lords. That ensures that those with some real-world competence can be selected.

                    The remaining positions are the mandatory Anglican bishops (26).

                    http://www.parliament.uk/mps-lords-and-offices/lords/composition-of-the-lords/

      2. Naughtyhorse

        Re: greatest female leaders this country has ever had.

        Boudica??

        If you mean TBW... you need to take more water with it

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: greatest female leaders this country has ever had. @Symon

          Ah yes the Ken Clarke live mike interview. Don't you think he may just be deluding himself that either one of these candidates would go against the "Will of the people"?

          1. MJI Silver badge

            Re: greatest female leaders this country has ever had. @Symon

            Don't knock the chap.

            Ken Clarke is one of the most respected politiicians of his era.

            He knew what he was doing.

            As to general Conservative membership, don't do a Corbyn, do vote for least worse option, my MP is doing that, so general members do the same please.

            And just remember that we do not like nutjobs like Leadsom. The UK could handle a May but not the nutjob.

        2. Suricou Raven

          Re: greatest female leaders this country has ever had.

          She who lead her people into a war that they had no realistic prospect of ever winning, and thus lost?

      3. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Andrea Leadsom...

        'To me they both look like worthy successors to one of the greatest female leaders this country has ever had.'

        Which one? Mary I?

    2. inmypjs Silver badge

      Re: Andrea Leadsom...

      "Rated for what?"

      I will judge her not for coming up with a dumb idea (4 years ago) but by how she reacts when someone explains to her why it is dumb.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: The IT Crowd

      Where is that black box they called the 'Internet' currently kept?, we need to locate from its secured location and give it to Andrea Leadsom for safe keeping ASAP, she needs to understand the true responsibility of safely storing this, for future generations. Just don't let Theresa near it.

      Signed,

      TheRegister

      1. Crazy Operations Guy

        Re: The IT Crowd

        I'd imagine that they put it back up on the top of Big Ben* once they finished fixing it.

        *(yeah I know is technically Elizabeth Tower and that 'Big Ben' is just the bell inside it and yes, I am an American, don't faint)

    4. streaky

      Re: Andrea Leadsom...

      It's obviously physically and budgetarily impossible to do this so it's not a real issue. Stuff May thinks is a thing on the other hand..

  2. Oliver Mayes

    So every website worldwide will be required to submit themselves to an independent British organisation, likely charging extortionate fees al la the film board for each rating. Those people will be required to review all content on the website before reaching a conclusion.

    How will they handle dynamic content? Will all news organisations be required to submit their articles to the board for approval before being allowed to publish? There's obviously no risk of censorship there.

    What about forums, where anyone is allowed to comment, will this board be reviewing individual comments before they're allowed to be displayed?

    Sounds like yet another politician trying to regulate something they have zero understanding of. Perhaps they should just encourage the parents to actually do some parenting instead of requiring the government to act as an online nanny service for their spawn.

    1. Rich 11

      And how long would it be before t'British t'Internet was entirely coincidentally swamped with new sites generating pages which are the equivalent of watching paint dry?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Wait, so...

        ... so someone can guarantee that this internet ratings firm will run their zero-day-infused flash video?

      2. g e

        Or better...

        A site that generates infinite pages of AI-assembled text

        1. Trigonoceps occipitalis

          Re: Or better...

          One day at the British Board of Site Checkers:

          "We need a translator to check that this page is not pornographic, it appears to be in Latin - Lorem Ipsum ... "

        2. Robert Moore
          Joke

          Re: Or better...

          > A site that generates infinite pages of AI-assembled text

          Just hire amanfrommars1. No need for AI.

          Maybe this is what the Reg forums are for already?

      3. Alan J. Wylie

        Better than watching paint dry: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spider_trap.

        And would the spider respect robots.txt?

    2. This post has been deleted by its author

    3. Adam 1

      ah, now it makes sense

      Why sometimes my comments end up awaiting moderator approval.

      You were waiting for the BBFC!

      1. m0rt

        Re: ah, now it makes sense

        Wouldn't it make more sense to ban under 16s from unsupervised use of the internet? Makes more sense, and easier to implement.

        Sorry under 16 year olds, but I feel that you shouldn't be used as an excuse to enforce rules on the rest of the population.

      2. Michael Habel
        Trollface

        Re: ah, now it makes sense

        Only you old hags would agree with this... Quit screwing 'round with your kids futures!

    4. Novex

      Leadballoon's idea to block unrated sites is absurd, and the issue of dynamic content is always going to be a problem. However, if all unrated sites are treated as '18', and any site that wants to be rated less had to go through a monitoring scheme then maybe something could be made of it. However, monitoring costs money, a lot of money, and I don't see the Government paying for it. Many sites, especially hobby forums that have under 18 viewers and contributors, are run on practically no money (needing donations to keep going as advertising is often not enough to cover bandwidth) so they simply aren't going to be able to afford to pay for monitoring. Also, should the ISPs police this, really, or should it be some form of age rating built into browsers? To be brutally honest, trying to classify websites is like whack-a-mole and ultimately doomed to failure, even if the reasons for doing so come from honestly good intentions.

      1. Bluenose

        ahh but you forget.....

        Now we have voted to leave the EU we will soon have £350 million a week to spend on this activity. See there was a plan, which is more than I can say about Theresa May and the Home Office IT projects she has ultimate responsibility for.

    5. Flocke Kroes Silver badge
      Joke

      Clearly you lot lack positive thinking

      If the BBFC needs a few million people to review British web pages then that is an instant end to unemployment! So what if we need to print £50M per day to pay for it and the exchange rate plummets to zero. Everyone will just have to stop going abroad and Buy British. As for foreign websites, just cut the cables. We are leaving the EU. We might as well leave the rest of the planet at the same time.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Clearly you lot lack positive thinking

        ..." So what if we need to print £50M per day to pay for it and the exchange rate plummets to zero."

        hmm, £50m per day x 7 = £350m per week.No wwhere have I heard that figure before?

        By Jingo, I think I've just realised a way we could pay for it!

    6. Kubla Cant

      yet another politician trying to regulate something they have zero understanding of

      How can you say such a thing. Just look at her CV. Andrea Leadsom will have learned everything there is to know about IT during the time she was a Director in charge of thousands of employees and billions of pounds.

    7. Lyndon Hills 1

      Unemployment?

      problem solved.

    8. Danny 14

      Lol. And this woman wants control of our nuclear arsenal? Sweet jesus.

    9. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Well, they expect overseas porn websites to comply with their age verification demands, so...

      1. Mark 85

        Well, they expect overseas porn websites to comply with their age verification demands, so...

        I'm sure if they offered the positions for that, they could charge the raters.

        I'm thinking along lines of Woody Allen:

        Michael: Did you get a job?

        Victor: Yes, I got something at the strip-tease. I help the girls dress and undress.

        Michael: Nice job.

        Victor: Twenty francs a week.

        Michael: Not very much.

        Victor: It's all I could afford.

    10. Someone Else Silver badge
      Devil

      @ Oliver Mayes

      What about forums, where anyone is allowed to comment, will this board be reviewing individual comments before they're allowed to be displayed?

      Well, Just in case this should come to pass, I'll need to get this in fast:

      Fuck

      Shit

      Piss

      Cunt

      Cocksucker

      Motherfucker

      and

      Tits!

      ...and Tits doesn't even belong on the list!

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