Children as young as three are “being fed content and algorithms designed to hook adults” on social media, a former education minister has warned.

Lord John Nash said analysis by the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) suggesting more than 800,000 UK children aged between three and five were already engaging with social media was “deeply alarming”.

The peer, who served as minister for the school system between 2013 and 2017, said that “children who haven’t yet learned to read [are] being fed content and algorithms designed to hook adults”, which, he said, “should concern us all”.

He called for “a major public health campaign so parents better understand the damage being done, and legislation that raises the age limit for social media to 16 whilst holding tech giants to account when they fail to keep children off their platforms”.

The CSJ reached the figure by applying the latest population data to previous research by Ofcom.

The internet and communications watchdog found that almost four in 10 parents of a three to five year-old reported that their child uses at least one social media app or site.

With roughly 2.2 million children in this age group as of 2024, the CSJ said this suggests there could be 814,000 users of social media between three and five years old, a rise of around 220,000 users from the year before.

Lord Nash is among those who have demanded the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill ban under-16s from having access to social media, something that will become law in Australia next month.

From 10 December, social media platforms will have to take reasonable steps to prevent under-16s from having a social media account, in effect blocking them from platforms such as Meta’s Instagram, TikTok and Snap’s Snapchat.

Ministers hope it will protect children from harmful content and online predators.

But one teenager who is against the idea is suing the Australian government as, he says, the measure would make the internet more dangerous for young people, many of whom would ignore the ban.

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Noah Jones, 15, co-plaintiff in a High Court case said a better plan would be “cutting off the bad things about social media”, adding, “I most likely will get around the ban. I know a lot of my mates will”.

UK campaigners have called for stronger policies to stop students using phones in schools, which already have the power to ban phones.

The CSJ wants to see smartphones banned in all schools “to break the 24-hour cycle of phone use”, and said a public health campaign is needed “to highlight the harms of social media”.

Last week Health Secretary Wes Streeting said he worries “about the mind-numbing impact of doomscrolling on social media on young minds and our neurodevelopment”.

Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces says it has captured Babanusa, a transport junction in the south of the country, just a month after the fall of Al Fashir to the same group.

The RSF said in a statement the seizure of the city in West Kordofan state came as it repelled “a surprise attack” by the Sudanese army in what it called “a clear violation of the humanitarian truce”.

The paramilitary group added it had “liberated” the city in the state, which has become the latest frontline in the war in Sudan.

It comes just over a month after the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) withdrew from military positions in the heart of Al Fashir, the capital of North Darfur, and the symbolic site was captured by the RSF with no resistance.

The RSF claimed at the time it had taken over the city and completed its military control of the Darfur region, where the administration of former US president Joe Biden has accused the group of committing genocide.

The war between the Sudanese army and the RSF – who were once allies – started in Khartoum in April 2023 but has spread across the country.

About 12 million people are believed to have been displaced and at least 40,000 killed in the civil war, according to the World Health Organization (WHO) – but aid groups say the true death toll could be far greater.

Tom Fletcher, the UN’s under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs, recently told Sky’s The World With Yalda Hakim the situation was “horrifying”.

“It’s utterly grim right now – it’s the epicentre of suffering in the world,” he said of Sudan.

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The United States, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Saudi Arabia – known as the Quad – earlier in November proposed a plan for a three-month truce followed by peace talks.

The RSF responded by saying it had accepted the plan, but soon after attacked army territory with a barrage of drone strikes.

Rescue and recovery and efforts are under way in parts of South and Southeast Asia where the number of those killed in devastating floods continues to rise.

Cyclones and extreme weather have killed at least 1,200 people in Sri Lanka, Indonesia and Thailand, according to authorities.

Rescuers are still searching for hundreds of missing people after a cyclone and other storms triggered flooding and landslides in the region.

In a post on X, the King and Queen Camilla said they were “deeply saddened” to hear about devastating storms and added their “heartfelt condolences” to the families of those who have died.

Hundreds of thousands in shelters in Sri Lanka

Sri Lankan authorities said about 218,000 people were in temporary shelters after downpours that triggered landslides, primarily in the tea-growing central hill country.

People were seen salvaging belongings from flooded homes along the banks of the Kelani River, near the capital Colombo on Monday.

Meanwhile, train and flight services have resumed after being disrupted last week, but schools stayed closed, officials said.

Cyclone Ditwah was the “largest and most challenging” natural disaster in Sri Lanka’s history, President Anura Kumara Dissanayake said.

The cyclone also brought heavy rain to India’s southern state of Tamil Nadu over the weekend, with authorities saying three people were killed in rain-related incidents.

The storm, which as of 5pm UK time on Monday was about 20km (12 miles) off the coast of the state capital Chennai, has weakened into a “deep depression” and was expected to weaken further in the next few hours, weather officials said.

Over a million affected in Indonesia

More than 28,000 homes have been damaged in Indonesia, with 1.4 million people affected by torrential rains following a tropical storm that formed in the Malacca Strait.

The country’s president, Prabowo Subianto, called it a catastrophe and pledged to rebuild infrastructure as he visited the three affected provinces on Monday, where nearly 300,000 people have been displaced by the flooding.

‘Nothing remains’

“The water just rose up into the house and we were afraid, so we fled. Then we came back on Friday, and the house was gone, destroyed,” said Afrianti, 41, who only goes by one name and lives in West Sumatra’s Padang city.

She and her family of nine have made their own tent shelter beside the single wall that remains of their home.

“My home and business are gone, the shop is gone. Nothing remains. I can only live near this one remaining wall,” she said.

Highest one-day rainfall in Thai city for 300 years

In Thailand, flooding in eight southern provinces affected about three million people and led to a major mobilisation of its military to evacuate critical patients from hospitals and reach people stuck in floodwaters for days.

In the worst-affected city of Hat Yai, a southern trading hub, 335mm (13 inches) of rain fell on 21 November, its highest single-day tally in 300 years, followed by days of unrelenting downpours.

King offers ‘heartfelt condolences’

King Charles and Queen Camilla responded to the crisis in a statement posted on X and praised the work of emergency responders: “We wish to express our heartfelt condolences to the families of those who have so tragically lost their lives.

“Our thoughts and prayers are with the many whose homes have been destroyed and to all who are awaiting news of loved ones missing.

“These disasters remind us of the increasingly urgent need to restore the balance and harmony of Nature.”

Thailand’s Prime Minister Anutin Charnivirakul expects residents to be able to return home within seven days, a government spokesperson said on Monday.

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The first batch of compensation payments was set to be distributed on Monday, starting with 239m baht (£5.6m) for 26,000 people, the spokesperson added.

In Malaysia there have been at least three deaths and authorities are still on alert for a second and third wave of flooding as 11,600 remain in evacuation centres.