There are many ways you as a parent can manage this, not least McAfee or people like OpenDNS.
Who are Plusnet to be the arbiters what is and is not acceptable?  No I don't thin Plusnet should be doing anything, I don't want my internet censored, if you do, do it yourself, its easy enough.

I would suspect most ISP's don't supply filtering software. Personally I use OpenDNS.

Welcome to the forum, AdamW. 
It is commendable that you wish to keep your children safe online. Were mine still living here, I would feel the same.
However, I don't believe that any responsibility should be with the ISP - it's their job to provide whatever their customers want - not what they think they should be allowed.
It's disappointing that MPs once again are trying to make ISPs arbiters of taste.

Quote from: AdamW

Just reading about Parliamentary report published today on the need for ISPs to do more to help parents protect their children from online porn, suicide sites, pro-anorexia sites etc. Phoned Plusnet tonight to see what filter options they could offer and was told they couldn't help.

that’s what parents are for, not ISPs or governments

How about trying supervising your own children?
A machine can't do it all for you.

I don't know if it provides a ballance here but this topic is somewhat the opposite angle: http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,102621.0.html

I may have been using the internet too long but when my niece came to stay (and was under 16) she wasn't allowed to use my laptop anywhere that we couldn't see what she was doing, also really annoyed her by setting parental controls up in Kaspersky so it logged her out at food time and at 9pm.
It isn't an ISP's job to police peoples children though, it's parental responsibility.  I laugh and sigh at the same time when I read about parents being shocked at what their children are up to when they allow them to have a PC with a webcam in their bedroom.  I don't have kids, but if I did they wouldn't be allowed a computer in their bedroom, and especially not a webcam, they would have access to a computer where I could look over my shoulder and see what they are doing on the computer.
Just remember, kids are smart, they are very smart, your ISP sets up a filter so you think you're safe and let them use a PC where you can't watch?  100% positive that they will get around the ISP's filter, they would even figure out a way to get past any software you have on the PC itself to restrict their access (OpenDNS above, great in theory, kids will just change the DNS settings in the OS).
There was a TV show on a fair while ago showing what kids actually watch on their PC's, the PC's were taken away for forensic examination and then the parents were taken to a room and shown some of the stuff their kids were watching, I say some of the stuff because quite a lot of it was illegal in the UK, the parents were naturally shocked, I was shocked at the parents letting their kids have the kind of access to a PC so they could watch it!
So yeah, looking after your kids on the internet is a parents responsibility, throwing the blame elsewhere is a slippery rope, you install software which blocks content, the kids get around it (as they will, usually by searching the internet for ways around it....) the blame will be stuck on the people who make the software, or the ISP or the router or... anything but the parents.

Hi,
If you'd like to have control over what your children can access on the Internet then you can do this with Plusnet Protect. https://www.plus.net/support/security/spam/plusnet_protect.shtml
It has parental controls which allow you to set access restrictions along with other settings, take a look here for more info: https://www.plus.net/support/security/spam/plusnet_protect_user_guide.shtml#parentalcontrolfeatures

When my children were younger I used to use K9 Web Protection which worked well http://www1.k9webprotection.com/
Bob

I think one significant problem if ISPs were to block content (optional or not) would be the varying opinions on what content should and should not be blocked, there'd be people complaining about 'unsuitable content' getting through and others complaining about being unable to see 'acceptable content', there is a surprisingly wide 'grey line'.
Some better routers offer content screening but, again, the lists can seem pretty arbitrary and some require a paid subscription to keep up to date, options such as blacklisting can be limited and whitelisting tends to be over-restrictive for most though that may be the best option for younger children.
I assume that DNS based services can be bypassed if IP addresses are known?
The PlusNet protect seems to offer some decent options, particularly defining the age range but sometimes kids can & will find a way of disabling software, changing settings or logging in as another user.
I'm also surprised by the number of 11 year-olds, for example, who own or have use of i-Phones, Blackberrys and similar devices which are certainly more difficult to monitor than a PC and may be a lot more difficult to block.
Some very good points mad by  'purleigh' and 'David W'.

Quote from: purleigh

[quote=walker23]I assume that DNS based services can be bypassed if IP addresses are known?

While that is true, why would any responsible parent allow their children's computer login to have administrator privileges - which would be required to alter the network settings.

Don't think that is what they mean. If you know the IP address like 212.58.246.92 for www.bbc.co.uk then using the DNS to block access is probably not going to work.