Twitter must remove hate posts in a day, says Yvette

TWITTER must do more to stamp out abuse by taking down posts within 24 hours, a senior Labour MP demanded last night.

Yvette Cooper warned that the web giant was ‘too slow to act’ on removing abusive tweets that violate its own rules.

In a letter co-written with the Fawcett Society – which campaigns for gender equality – the former Cabinet minister called for the social media site to take action.

It comes as Crown Prosecution Service guidelines yesterday said hate crime committed in cyber- space should be taken as seriously as face-to-face offences. Miss Cooper said: ‘Twitter claims to stop hate speech, but it just doesn’t do it in practice ... it is too slow to act so it just keeps giving a platform to hatred and extremism. It’s disgraceful and irresponsible.’

Research from a cross-party anti-abuse campaign set up by Miss Cooper found offensive posts remained on Twitter for days after being reported.

A Twitter spokesman said last night: ‘Abuse and harassment have no place on Twitter.’