Beverley Hughes: Plans will help the police

Anger over a Channel 4 broadcast which satirised media coverage of paedophilia is overshadowing the launch of tough new plans to target child sex offenders.

The government's proposed changes to the Sex Offenders' Register will widen the range of offences that trigger registration. Courts would also consider whether a violent offence was sexually motivated and if so require the offender to register.

The move would see burglary with intent to rape requiring automatic registration and more people convicted of indecent assault added to the register.

The government is also proposing that police forces would be able to apply though magistrates' courts for orders to add UK and foreign nationals who commit sex offences abroad to the list of offenders.

Home Office minister Beverley Hughes said the plans would enhance the effectiveness of the Sex Offenders' Register and help to protect the public.

"The inclusion of burglary with intent to rape, giving courts the discretion to require offenders convicted of sexually motivated violent offences to register, and increasing the number of offenders convicted of indecent assault on the register, will help police in their monitoring of sex offenders in the community," she said.

The change in rules will see a substantial increase in the numbers listed. There are currently around 16,000 people on the register and ministers expect this to rise by 4000 a year.

Ministers, however, will reject calls for the paedophiles register to be made public. Last year, the News of the World launched a campaign for the sex offenders register to be made public following the murder of schoolgirl Sarah Payne.

However, the announcement of the clamp down comes when media coverage of the issue is being dominated by the Channel 4 programme Brass Eye, which last week broadcast a satirical portrayal of media coverage of paedophilia.

Ministers lined up over the weekend to criticise the programme - with culture minister Tessa Jowell hitting out at Channel 4.

"If this is considered acceptable then we are tearing down all the boundaries of decency on television," she said.

Jowell said the government would consider giving the Independent Television Commission, which received 600 complaints about the broadcast, new powers to act against programmes which infringe normal standards of public decency.

Beverley Hughes also added to the controversy, saying the programme was "unspeakably sick". Home secretary David Blunkett was also said to be livid about the broadcast.

Channel 4 defended the programme, suggesting its critics were "missing the point of the satire". The station added that the programme asked "hard questions about the way society and the media deal with its most difficult problems".

During the show, a number of celebrities and politicians made increasingly ridiculous comments about use of the internet by paedophiles, including the suggestion that toxic vapours from keyboards could make children more susceptible. The programme also featured an angry mob burning a paedophile and a man in stocks being offered a young boy.