Australia's Leader Takes On Social Media.Can He Win?

PRIME MINISTER ANTHONY ALBANESE

- CHARLIE CAMPBELL/CANBERRA

The press conference starts like any other: Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is grilled on everything from affordable housing and war in the Middle East to his relationship with U.S. President Donald Trump.

Then, Lana, 11, picks up the microphone. “Do you think social media has an impact on kids?” asks the suburban Canberra primary school student.

Of all the burning issues of the day, it’s the one that Albanese feels on surest ground to answer. It also goes to the heart of his government’s most eye-catching policy—one that directly affects Lana and the other student reporters invited to interrogate Australia’s top politician for Behind the News, a long-running kids’ current-affairs show.

“It certainly does, and that’s why we're going to ban social media for under-16s,” Albanese replies resolutely. “I want to see you all out playing with each other at lunchtime, talking to each other like we are now, and engaging with each other ... rather than just being on your devices.”

The fact that Australia’s Prime Minister carved out 45 minutes between parliamentary sessions to indulge kids at least two terms from voting age underlines his belief that social media represents an unambiguous threat to his nation’s most precious resource: its children. And he is determined to do something about it.