Education must work with regulation in "My Feed, My Way"
Wednesday, 9 Sep 2026
Following yesterday’s “My Feed, My Way” announcement by the Prime Minister, Life Ed Australia warns of the potential for continued loss of life should the Federal Government once again rely solely on regulation without building in a mandatory preventative education approach.
We welcome the Federal Government’s Digital Duty of Care and 'My Feed, My Way’ initiative. However, we are setting our kids and families up for failure when there is a focus on restriction, without investment in a compulsory and consistent preventative education approach.
If we look at the social media delay, much of the criticism has been about challenges with enforcement and the fact that many children under the age of 16 continue to access to social media accounts. We must learn from this and strengthen how we embed education alongside regulation. This is the key to long-term behaviour change. This is the only way we will save young lives.
If we look at the social media delay, much of the criticism has been about challenges with enforcement and the fact that many children under the age of 16 continue to access to social media accounts. We must learn from this and strengthen how we embed education alongside regulation. This is the key to long-term behaviour change. This is the only way we will save young lives.
Life Ed Australia is known for their iconic Healthy Harold program and has been trusted for almost half a century to develop and deliver early education because of the impact this has made across communities and generations.
“We have lost too many young people to harmful algorithms. Death shouldn’t be the precursor to prevention, especially when the answer is as simple as education,” continued Ms Robertson.
“We have the tools and evidence that this works. What’s needed is a shift from crisis intervention to early education, and this takes long-term investment to reach kids when it counts.”
As a Trusted eSafety Provider, Life Ed Australia’s evidence-informed, curriculum-aligned, strengths-based and age-appropriate approach to online safety and respectful relationships education continues to be impactful in primary schools across the country, with results from the Life Ed Quarterly Impact and Learning Report (Term 4, 2025) showing:
- 93–98% of teachers reported evidence of student engagement, learning and applied skill development.
- 86–89% of teachers reported improved confidence, preparedness and likelihood of embedding program concepts into classroom practice.
- 96–99% of teachers rated Life Ed Educators highly across expertise, safe learning environments, and responsiveness to student needs.
Life Ed Australia’s best practice approach provides multiple touchpoints in and beyond the classroom to encourage open conversations and the practice of positive decision-making with teachers, parents and peers.
“While action is needed now and regulation is important. Foresight should not be forgotten. We need to come at this insidious issue from multiple angles. We need to use all the tools in our arsenal,” shared Ms Robertson.
