Parliament Motions to Ban 'Step' and Other Taboo Porn in the U.K.

LONDON—The latest amendments to the United Kingdom's sweeping Crime and Policing Bill will prohibit step-family and other taboo pornography categories. These amendments come after the same bill was amended to prohibit simulated incest content.

The Crime and Policing Bill's current form, as of March 3, would expand criminal prohibitions on porn categories that depict "step-family" sexual relationships, despite being fictional and simulated. According to Pornhub Insight's 2025 Year in Review, "step mom" remains one of the most searched terms on the popular tube site. 

If the law is fully implemented, an entire class of pornography series and features depicting step-relationships would be subject to potential criminal prosecution by the Crown Prosecution Service and local, regional and national law enforcement agencies, like the Metropolitan Police Service and other regional police agencies.

Such criminal liability could potentially chill forms of sexual expression and pornography productions that are otherwise legal and viewed as consensual in the United States and other Western countries. Before the House of Lords, the Crime and Policing Bill was amended on March 2 by a majority vote of 1: 144 in favor, 143 opposed.

Baroness Gabby Bertin, MP, the peer who led Parliament's independent review on the alleged harms of pornography, spoke to the Lords, urging restrictions on content that depicts taboo material, like "intercourse with a step-child." Bertin remarked, “In fact, in the U.K., around half of all sexual abuse cases against children are perpetrated by step parents, yet the depiction of this type of pornography allows porn companies to profit from content that depicts something which is utterly illegal in the U.K.”

The amendments also prohibit imagery of legal adults who are portraying themselves as minors, likening such videos and images to legitimate depictions of child sexual abuse and non-consensual intimate interactions. Bertin added that online pornography depicts sexual scenes "with settings in children's bedrooms, with actors in children's clothes, braces, toys, pigtails, and other markers of childhood. Millions of videos and images are then tagged as 'little,' 'tiny,' 'age gap,' 'mommy,' 'daddy,' or 'teen.'" 
 
Consent withdrawal provisions were also added to the sweeping Crime and Policing Bill, allowing anyone who appears in adult content to withdraw consent at any time, or producers of the material could face imprisonment and fines. Initial consent to publication would be viewed as irrelevant. If consent is withdrawn, platforms and studios must comply with the request and remove the content within 24 hours of notice. Baroness Alison Levitt said she supported the sentiment behind the consent withdrawal policy but found its enforcement problematic. Levitt observed before the House of Lords, "Where content is produced legally, as with the wider film industry, the rules and regulations governing its use are usually a commercial matter to be agreed between the performer and the production company, taking into account the intellectual property framework.” That framework could pose further risks to adult entertainment performers, including those based in the United Kingdom.
 
While the regulations and prohibitions apply to the United Kingdom's digital space, the implications for U.S.-based adult entertainment could pose a transnational legal conundrum. That is a concern for adult industry attorney Corey Silverstein. Silvertsein explained to AVN, "First things first, the amendments to this bill have been going back and forth for quite some time, and so this isn’t going to pass overnight. Nonetheless, I am very concerned and alarmed about these developments.

"The revocation of consent will virtually kill conventional porn production in the U.K.," he continued. "While solo performances would pretty much remain unchanged, multiple performers and conventional studios would be taking a major risk to continue business as normal in the U.K. if these amendments ultimately pass."

Silverstein added, "The step-content ban would also be a substantial change and would require platforms to remove an unquantifiable amount of content." He warned that Baroness Bertin is working to eliminate pornography as an entertainment industry in the United Kingdom as a whole.

"Her specific wording calling for the 'business disruption across the porn ecosystem' couldn’t be any clearer. The entire industry needs to continue to closely monitor this situation, as it could have catastrophic effects if it becomes law and credit card companies decide to act or follow suit."

Note, the legal protections for "virtual child pornography," or pornography depicting adults portraying minors and young people, are affirmed by existing case law in the United States. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition that porn producers are permitted "the freedom to engage in a substantial amount of lawful speech," including protections of speech that featured adults playing in roles of children. This decision protected and advanced taboo pornography categories.

The Crime and Policing Bill, initiated last year, is in the report stage in the House of Lords. The bill advanced through the House of Commons last summer, as AVN reported.