International Politics

[benji]

Act Party leader and senior minister David Seymour says he stands by his interactions with school-aged young people on social media platform Snapchat, some as young as 14.

His political messaging online with those too young to vote is now in focus – at the same time as calls in Australia led to a debate here about limiting under-16s’ access and use of social media platforms. Seymour said this week he’s open to the idea of digital services having age limits.

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Seymour has been using the direct messaging platform Snapchat, which was particularly popular with young people, for political messaging since the 2014 election campaign.

He says he “used it extensively” during the period he was on Dancing with the Stars in 2018. School-aged children would send him messages, including photos of themselves in uniform, and he always responded.

Seymour says he still uses it to reply to “serious questions” a few times a month and does not see any issue with directly messaging young people without parental permission or oversight.

His interactions have become the subject of online discussion in recent weeks, with debate among some of those who were in contact with him in past years.

It’s not altogether new. Over the years, young people on Twitter, TikTok and Reddit have sporadically raised their school age interactions with Seymour.

But since May, when a TikTok post started to go viral, more young people who were still in secondary school when they directly messaged with Seymour have commented online.

It is not suggested the contents of his messages were inappropriate.

See, it's fine.