Pornography in the United Kingdom

Pornography in the United Kingdom has existed since the United Kingdom was formed by the Acts of Union 1800. Before that it was found in Great Britain which was formed by the Acts of Union 1707, and earlier still in the four countries of which the modern kingdom consists. The Victorian pornographic tradition included French photographs, erotic prints, and printed literature. As technology has advanced, pornography has taken diverse forms and become more widespread in society. In the twentieth century the production of pornographic magazines and films developed, and by the twenty-first century pornography was available by telephone, on television and via the internet. However, access to pornography has generally been more restricted than it has been in comparable Western countries.

The UK has a markedly different tradition of pornography regulation from that found in most other Western countries, which legalised hardcore pornography during the 1960s and 1970s. By contrast the UK was almost the only liberal democracy not to do so. Britain's obscenity laws, such as the Obscene Publications Act 1959, are strict by European standards and made the sale of hardcore pornography completely illegal until the end of the century, although ownership was not a criminal offence.

The UK is still the only Member State of the European Union that prohibits private imports of adult pornography by consumers coming from other Member States of the European Union. In the 2004–2005 fiscal year, the agents of HM Revenue and Customs seized 96,783 items of pornographic media carried by people travelling into the UK.

However the current British legislative framework including the Obscene Publications Act 1959 (in England and Wales), the Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982 and the Video Recordings Act 1984 leads to a confusing situation in which there is a theoretical ban on the publication and distribution (but not possession) of pornographic material in any form, which is in practice unenforcable due to the vagueness of the legal test of material that "depraves and corrupts". In the United Kingdom, the Obscene Publications Acts set the criteria for what material is allowed to be publicly accessed and distributed.

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