Both sides, in good faith

The strongest fair case each way — we don't pick a winner.

The case for

Advocates of tough action argue that platforms have a duty of care, particularly to under-18 users, and that content glamorising high-speed pursuits, cloned plates and reckless driving does not merely reflect existing bad behaviour but actively incentivises impressionable viewers to replicate it for views and status. They see the Online Safety Act as a proportionate, already-legislated tool that simply needs enforcing, and argue that after seven deaths, including two police officers, ministers would be failing in their basic responsibility if they did not press Ofcom to compel swift removals and stronger algorithmic safeguards from firms like TikTok that have the technical means to do so.

The case against

Others who share the same horror at the deaths nonetheless caution against ministers publicly directing a nominally independent regulator's enforcement priorities in the immediate aftermath of a tragedy, warning that emotionally charged, high-profile interventions risk producing rushed, overbroad takedown regimes that sweep up news coverage, documentary footage or unrelated driving content alongside genuinely harmful material. They argue that the deeper causes here, cloned plates, a police pursuit, and young people already inclined to dangerous driving, are not primarily a social media problem, and that treating platform content as the central lever risks a disproportionate, difficult-to-enforce regulatory response that does little to address the underlying causes while setting precedents for content policing that could later be applied more broadly.