A man who paid £18 for children in the Philippines to be sexually abused has been jailed for three years.

Graeme Wilson, 68, commissioned the abuse from his home in Barnet, London, before he was arrested in November 2019.

Police used information acquired from international partners and social media companies to identify chat logs where he directed people in the Philippines to perform sexual acts on children.

Wilson also told the children to abuse each other.

Julia Mcsorley from the Crown Prosecution Service said: "Wilson’s intended victims were as young as 13 and the acts he requested were distressing and depraved."

Two of the facilitators were apprehended in the Philippines earlier in 2019.

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The chat logs showed Wilson, a former security controller, engaged in directing the sexual abuse of children aged 13-16 on at least four occasions in 2017.

Investigators also uncovered evidence that he had paid the facilitators between 1200 and 1500 pesos (£18-£23) per live stream.

Wilson was charged with arranging and facilitating the commission of a child sex offence and arranging or facilitating the sexual exploitation of a child.

He pled guilty to all the charges.

He will be subject to a Sexual Harm Prevention Order and was placed on the Sex Offenders Register for life.

Adam Priestley from the National Crime Agency said: “Wilson played a significant role in the sexual abuse of children thousands of miles away from him.

“He paid for them to be exploited for his own gratification, the fact he did so from behind a screen doesn’t absolve him of any responsibility.

“His actions helped fuel the demand for this financially motivated criminality in the Philippines, which is a significant threat globally and within the UK.