That's exactly what it is, control and surveillance. They don't like that the public have stuff that isn't accessable. I wonder if they'll complain when they realise it'll be harder for them to hide their shadiness if they get rid of E2EE. Then again, they know they're shady, so it feels like a case of, we're shady so you must be too. So now we want to see everything you do so we can watch and control you better.
It's not about the children, governments pull the children or terrorism card because people see those words and don't think to look deeper, cause if you go against the policy you must hate children and want the country to burn!