Macron considers ban on screens for children under three

Very young girl staring at smartphone

Emmanuel Macron is considering banning children under three from using screens in a move proposed in an expert report.

The report, commissioned by the Elysée and handed in on Tuesday, also recommends a ban on under-11s owning mobile phones, and prohibiting those under the age of 15 from using social media.

It warns of the perils of “hyper-connection” among children and “the consequences for their health, their development, their future”, but also for the future of “our society, our civilisation”.

The 10-strong commission, co-chaired by Servane Mouton, a neurologist, and Amine Benyamina, an addiction psychiatrist, said it was “shaken” by content providers’ “strategies for capturing children’s attention”.

“There was a clear consensus on the direct and indirect negative effects of screens, particularly on sleep, a sedentary lifestyle – which encourages obesity – and short-sightedness,” the report warns.

Nursery classes ‘should lose televisions’  

To “take back control”, the commission calls for a blanket ban on all use of screens by children under the age of three, followed by “severely limited” access between the ages of three and six offering only “content of educational quality and accompanied by an adult”.

The experts also call for the use of mobile phones and televisions in maternity wards to be “limited as far as possible”, and recommend that computers and televisions be banned from crèches and nursery classes.

They also want “reinforced action” with childminders and a ban on most connected toys before the age of six.

Emmanuel Macron commissioned the report as fears grew in France over the effect of screens and social media on children – LUDOVIC MARIN/AFP VIA GETY IMAGES

Mobile phones should only be allowed from the age of 11, and internet access from 13. Social network access should only be granted from 15, and then only to networks deemed “ethical”.

The report urged that teenagers should be kept away from TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat until 18.

The experts pointed to social networks as a “risk factor” for depression or anxiety, in cases of “pre-existing vulnerability”. The amount of child exposure to pornographic and violent content “appears alarming”, they added.

“Cognitive bias is used to lock children on to their screens, control them, re-engage them and monetise them,” Mr Benyamina told Ouest-France.

“It’s an economy of capture. Parents are virtually out of the picture, faced with a market that has imposed itself on society,”  he added.

Young used social media to fuel riots

“What struck us is that the professionals’ priority is not the protection of children. Behind the rhetoric, it’s ‘business at every level’,” said Ms Mouton.

France has been locked in a heated debate over how to clamp down on bullying and suicides linked to teens’ use of social media. When riots erupted last July, President Macron warned that minors, who made up the bulk of rioters, were egging each other on via social networks.

Earlier this month, Gabriel Attal, the prime minister, called for a “surge of authority” to combat “the addiction of some of our teenagers to violence” after a 15-year-old was beaten to death outside his school in Viry-Chatillon.

“Attacking evil at its root also means regulating screens”, he said, describing social networks as “an accelerator of hatred” and a “catalyst of violence”.

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