The Solicitor General has said sex offenders who download or share indecent images were just as ‘insidious’ as those who committed direct sexual abuse

THE Government has vowed to get tough on paedophiles who download sickening child abuse images, handing out tougher prison sentences.

The drive comes as official figures show that just one in four sentenced by a crown court over child pornography offences is jailed.

The Solicitor General Robert Buckland said that sex offenders who download or share indecent images should be dealt with by the courts as harshly as those who abuse children themselves.

He said it was just as “insidious” as direct sexual abuse.

Buckland told: “We have got to make sure that it’s fully understood that use of the internet to download and share images of child abuse is as insidious a crime as direct sexual assault.

“I’m talking about people who are using the internet to exploit children.

Half were given suspended sentences and a fifth were given community sentences.

Of the 14,624 paedophiles sentenced over child abuse images between 2007 and 2017, only 4,683 were jailed.

Nearly 10,000 were given suspended sentences and community sentences.

Dave Thompson, the chief constable of West Midlands Police, has said that society needs to have a “big discussion” on whether people who viewed child abuse images should be prosecuted.

He said last year: “Of course it makes us all deeply uncomfortable to think that people who engage in those activities should in any way escape punishment but the scale of it is absolutely huge.”

Simon Bailey, the National Police Chiefs’ Council lead for child protection, has suggested that paedophiles who viewed indecent images should not be charged or taken to court unless they posed a physical threat to children.