– I think that this debate is only at its initial stage. In the long term, there will be quite strict rules for this, both nationally and internationally. I am really sitting and waiting for more and more states in the US and the EU to tighten strongly, says parliamentary representative Peter C. Frølich.
– The health issues associated with it are so great that they cannot be ignored from a political point of view, he believes.
Frølich leads the resolution committee at the national meeting and wanted the Conservative Party to adopt a “school without mobile phones”. The statement highlighted, among other things, that the use of screens and social media leads to poor mental health, impaired ability to concentrate and poor reading skills.
But after a heated debate, the whole statement that Frølich wanted was rejected.
– The Rector’s decision
Former knowledge minister Jan Tore Sanner was among those who criticized the proposal from the podium. He pointed out that, according to Høyre’s programme, it is the principal who will make the decision to ban mobile phones at school.
– There is discussion around the kitchen table, in the teacher’s room, in the classroom and at parent meetings. Leave the discussion there, he said from the podium.
Sanner believes the statement was not about yes or no to cellphones, but about “the responsibility or disempowerment of schools and parents.”
Unge Høyre also spoke strongly against the declaration, and a number of delegates feared that the problem would be solved locally, and not with national laws passed in the Storting.
205 delegates eventually voted to remove the point on schools with no motive from the statement, including party leader Erna Solberg. 99 wanted to keep it. Shortly after, the whole statement was rejected.
16-year-old limit on social networks?
The resolution committee’s proposal, chaired by Peter C. Frølich, contained several controversial measures, including raising the age limit for social media to 15 or 16. This particular proposal was ultimately withdrawn.
A minority on the commission also wanted to regulate cell phone use in high schools.
The debate indicated that the proposals for many broke with fundamental ideological beliefs about the extent of state responsibility and its intervention in the responsibility of parents and teachers to care for children.
