Tougher stance on child exploitation

THE Turnbull Government will spend $68.6 million on a new centre for countering child exploitation in the May Budget, which will boost police and border force numbers to stamp out trafficking and livestreamed material.

Law enforcement officials expect the centre will identify and remove from harm more than 200 victims a year.

Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton says every nine minutes a child somewhere in the world appears on a web page being sexually exploited, while young girls are still sold into forced marriages.

“It’s horrific at every turn,” he told the Nine Network.

The Government wants to protect Australian children while working with its partners within the southeast Asia region and across the world to end the scourge.

“We have cancelled a re- cord number of visas of criminals who are here who have abused and violated Australian children,” Mr Dutton said.

“We want to make sure we can target those Australianbased paedophiles as well.”

The new Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation will be based in Brisbane because of its proximity to the Asia-Pacific and its status as a cyber hub.

It will bring together the expertise of the Australian Federal Police, the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission, Austrac, the Office of the Cyber Co-ordinator, Australian Border Force, Australian Institute of Criminology and other areas of the Department of Home Affairs.

Mr Dutton made the announcement jointly with Law Enforcement and Cyber Security Minister Angus Taylor. AAP