Ofcom fining a pro-suicide site is a win, but we need a public inquiry into government failures

Last week, the US-owned pro-suicide website that took my sister’s life was fined £950,000 by Ofcom. At long last, the regulator took a definitive step in enforcing the Online Safety Act and protecting vulnerable people on the internet. This was the first investigation Ofcom launched under the legislation; the website is responsible for the deaths of at least 135 people in the UK, including my sister Aimee. I am making a deliberate decision not to name the website.

This is a huge milestone for us as bereaved families, some of whom have been sounding the alarm since 2018, when this site was first established. In that time, 65 warnings have been issued by coroners to three government departments. To no avail; deaths continued while the website remained active and bad actors claimed they had played their part in the interests of free speech.

In the three and a half years since Aimee died, I’ve met many devastated families who’ve lost their loved ones to a nihilistic website that many don’t know exists. We’ve had to share our most traumatic experiences in the media in the hope that the government will listen and finally act. We truly believed it would prioritise the safety of British citizens and treat this crisis with the urgency it deserves, and that’s why, in 2025, we launched our campaign for a public inquiry.

This month, what would have been my sister’s 25th birthday falls days before the trial of Kenneth Law, a Canadian who is alleged to have set up a business selling poison to vulnerable people on this website. He may have shipped more than 1,200 packages to 40 countries around the globe.

The pro-suicide site is how Aimee found out about Law’s poison and, with a click of a button, she was able to get it delivered to our doorstep, with no interception from the UK Border Force. Law is now being charged with 14 counts of aiding and abetting suicide connected to 14 deaths in Ontario – with most of the victims being from gen Z. In the UK, the National Crime Agency’s investigation into Law is continuing, with 109 British victims confirmed.

Research published last month linked this poison to over a hundred UK deaths, with young people most at risk. Despite this, and warnings from mental health charities and coroners, the Home Office has consistently refused to strengthen regulation of the lethal substance under the Poisons Act.

And to add insult to injury, just a few weeks ago, the government rejected our calls to launch a public inquiry; the very mechanism that finally exposed the truth of the infected blood scandal and the Post Office Horizon scandal. It is what this country uses when the state has failed for years and only independent scrutiny will get to the truth.

Ofcom can fine and regulate websites, but it cannot investigate why government departments were warned for six years about this forum and did not act. Only a public inquiry can compel that. Now we’re waiting for a date from the government to meet with ministers to make it known we won’t give up until this is tackled at every level. But while we wait for that meeting, the forum is still reachable. That is the cost of delay: lives measured in real time.

This rejection of a public inquiry is an insult to bereaved families across the UK, and will lead to more preventable deaths. Ofcom’s decision only makes clearer the need for a statutory public inquiry into the website and the failings of successive governments to get a grip on a public health crisis that has cost our loved ones lives.

The regulator’s fine won’t bring back our loved ones, but it may at last lead to some accountability for those who profit from encouraging vulnerable people to take their own lives in malign online spaces. Increasingly, we’re recognising that the online world is one that needs to mirror the norms and rules we have offline – and we do not have time to waste.

Jess Phillips, the now former minister for safeguarding and violence against women and girls, put it clearly in her resignation letter to Keir Starmer last week: “How many children were left without a safety net in the time we dilly dallied and worried about tech bosses?”

In our digital world, we simply cannot wait and hope for sinister actors to voluntarily refrain from their actions, and we cannot excuse government inaction. We know the scale of harm that is happening online, and any further delay will be remembered as one of the biggest failings of our time.

In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie.

Illustration by Alexandra Newbould/The Canadian Press via AP