Teesside lecturer helps tackle Internet Paedophiles

A University of Teesside lecturer will be taking part in a national conference to discuss some of the key threats to children over the Internet as part of National Internet Safety Day.

Alisdair Gillespie, a law lecturer at the University’s School of Social Sciences & Law, is a member of the Government’s task force into child protection issues surrounding the Internet. Alisdair was invited to join the task force by the then Home Secretary, Jack Straw. He will attend a special National Internet Safety Day at the British Library in London on Friday 6 February to deliver a paper that concentrates on how the new Sexual Offences Act 2003 will help safeguard children from the threat of being ‘groomed’ over the world wide web.

Alisdair said: “The new Sexual Offences Act will help tackle those who seek to procure children over the Internet for sexual purposes by providing for the first time two statutory offences of procurement and grooming. This will allow law enforcement agencies to react appropriately to those who misuse the Internet in this way. The speech will also show how the police could use the new law to act proactively by posing as children on the Internet.”

The other speakers at the conference include representatives of the Home Office, Law Enforcement and Child Protection Charities.

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