An amendment to the ban on harmful content relating to pornography depicting sexual intercourse between step-relatives has been tabled in the upper house of the British Parliament by the current government. He only narrowly passed the vote in the House of Lords. 144 Lords were in favor and 143 were against, reports The Guardian.
When the amendment becomes legally valid, the possession or publication of pornographic material that depicts incest or sex between step-relatives, or in which one of the persons pretends to be under the age of eighteen, will be a crime. For the publication of such material, offenders will face two to five years in prison.
“I very much welcome the government’s plan to fully deal with harmful pornographic content such as incest, step-incest or imitation of child sexual abuse. This content is freely and widely available on the Internet and is deeply harmful because it normalizes child sexual abuse and violent relationships within families,” Bertin said after the vote.
Although the draft amendment was submitted by the government, some of the ministers were against it. According to them, this ban will be very difficult to enforce, because under English and Welsh laws, sexual relations between adults in a step-relative relationship are legal.
