Civil servants sacked for downloading net porn

At least 16 civil servants have been sacked and more than 200 disciplined over the downloading of internet porn in the office.

Staff at the Department for Work and Pensions are believed to have called up 2.3 million pages of pornographic material over eight months.

These are said to include 18,000 images and sites involving child abuse.

A police investigation has so far resulted in one worker being convicted and put on the sex offenders' register after accessing child pornography. Officers are looking at two similar cases.

As well as those who have been ordered to leave, three members of staff have resigned and 211 employees have faced internal disciplinary action.

The crackdown started last December after a civil servant was caught downloading porn on his office computer. A check made on all the computers of the department's 140,000 staf f found nearly 600,000 pornographic images had been called up in June and July alone.

Liberal Democrat work and pensions spokesman Steve Webb said: "Any public servant who accesses porn sites at work should lose their job. There has to be a zero tolerance approach."