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Howard on internet porn crusade - Coffee Break - 08-12-2007 03:17 AM
Howard on internet porn crusade
JOHN Howard is going to spend $189 million on "cleaning up the internet" for Australian families, blocking pornography, upgrading the search for chat-room sex predators and cutting off terror sites.
Every Australian family will be provided with a free internet filter and the federal Government will enter an unprecedented partnership with service providers to filter pornography at the source.
Communications and Australian Federal Police resources will be boosted immediately to expand checks on internet chat rooms to detect child predators, and privacy laws masking sex offenders on the net will be altered.
The Prime Minister unveiled his new net commandments last night on a webcast to more than 700 churches and thousands of churchgoers around the country.
Mr Howard and Kevin Rudd delivered the addresses on the 2007 election campaign to 770 Christian churches of all denominations.
Mr Howard and the Opposition Leader agreed to speak for 20 minutes and answer questions from church leaders at the National Press Club in Canberra as part of the Australian Christian Lobby's campaign to get Christians to make their vote count.
Both leaders attend church and have appealed to Christian voters to support them.
Last night, as Mr Howard talked about Christianity and family values, he revealed the government plan to upgrade the protection for families from internet pornography, violence and sexual predators.
As well as practical tools to assist families to put internet pornography beyond the reach of children, the Government will form partnerships with major computer providers in upgraded steps to block porn sites and detect predators using popular websites such as MySpace and Facebook to contact children.
Of the $189 million, $43million will be provided immediately to double the size of the online child sex exploitation branch of the AFP and establish a working group to find ways of getting around privacy laws that protect sexual predators.
A "black list" of the Australian Communications and Media Authority, which covers Australian-based pornographic and terror sites, will be expanded internationally after consultation with the Attorney-General.
AMCA will also receive 14 additional internet regulators.
A seven-day-a-week hotline will also be established to help parents put filters on their home computers. All families will receive the filters and they will also be sent to public libraries.
Mr Howard said last night the address to the churches was an ideal opportunity to address family and community concerns about internet pornography and cyber-stalking.
Mr Howard and Mr Rudd have been keen to tap into the voter base represented by the church, particularly in light of the faith-based support that helped Family First's Steve Fielding win a place in the Senate. The Liberal victory in the NSW seat of Greenway was also attributed, in part, to the participation of the local Hillsong congregation.
In marked contrast to Mark Latham at the last election, Mr Rudd has made it clear he wants to engage churches in the political debate.
Last year, Mr Rudd made a number of appeals for people of faith not to turn away from Labor.
It was the continuation of a theme he had begun almost as soon as the smoke had cleared after Labor's disastrous showing in the 2004 election under Mr Latham.
Early in 2005, Mr Rudd convened a meeting of Labor MPs to discuss the impact of religion and counteract anti-church feeling within the ALP.
Although Kim Beazley also had a strong religious faith, the elevation of Mr Rudd to the leadership put a stronger spotlight on the role of religion in politics.
Catholic-baptised Mr Rudd is now a churchgoing Anglican convert. Mr Howard, who goes to church, is also an Anglican.
The Australian Christian Lobby organised and hosted the Make it Count event with 200 church leaders and lay people at the Press Club last night to quiz the political leaders.
Churches from all Christian denominations participated in every state and territory. ACL managing director Jim Wallace said the aim was to engender policies "for an increasingly moral and caring society".
At least 100,000 people were believed to have watched the Howard and Rudd speeches last night. In Sydney a swag of people from the Hillsong church watched the speeches in inner-city "This is a valuable opportunity to highlight the importance of the Christian constituency in the lead up to the election and to ensure that the Christian influence has maximum impact," Mr Wallace said.
Jeremy Horn, 37, a web-developer from Pagewood, was among them.
He welcomed the Prime Minister's Netalert strategy, saying internet safety was an issue for his 12-year-old son.
"I want to know that he is safe online -- there are so many games sites he plays at the moment and a lot of them have chatrooms."
He said what was great about the evening was that "as an Australian who is a Christian I get to hear the leaders address me directly with my values in mind. So I can, like any Australian coming into the election, be better informed."
Anne Knock, 46, of Maroubra, an executive officer with Church Schools Australia, applauded the Netalert initiative as something that would protect children and "give parents tools that they can use to support their children; for kids, access to the internet is life".
Of Mr Howard's performance she said: "I felt he has a good understanding of the audience he's speaking to and the kinds of issues that are relevant to the Christian community across the nation.
"I just don't feel I can separate my world view from every decision I make and the more informed I am the better the decision is."
The webcast, organised by the Australian Christian Lobby, was the most significant initiative so far in the group's campaign to get politicians to recognise and respond to what managing director Jim Wallace calls the Christian "constituency".
News Limited
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