Member News
27th January 2012The latest National Audit Office (NAO) report examines mobile technology in policing and has criticised the programme for failing to deliver value for money.
The Mobile Information Programme, funded by the Home Office and managed by the National Policing Improvement Agency, equips frontline police officers with mobile devices, such as Blackberrys and personal data assistants. By March 2011 approximately 41,000 devices had been rolled out, in addition to around 10,000 already in use.
However, given the £80 million expenditure, Amyas Morse, head of the NAO, today said that ‘the benefits have not so far extended beyond simply allowing officers to spend more time out of the station’. The report states that the programme does not yet represent value for money.
While the availability of mobile technology has increased visibility of officers to the public, there is considerable variation as to the amount more time officers are able to spend out of the station, with an average increase of only eighteen minutes per shift.
To date, only a minority of forces, approximately one in five, have effectively used mobile technology to improve the efficiency of their business and operational processes. While cash savings were not an explicit objective it was thought this would be a by-product of reducing bureaucracy and increasing efficiency. This has yet to materialise and cash savings have been limited. Only ten out of thirty-two forces reported savings and the majority of these have been only minor.
Other criticisms raised included the fact that the mobile devices were distributed without proper assessment of how many exactly would be needed and how these would then be used to maximise the benefits.
The proportion of devices available to forces surveyed ranged from a device being available to one per cent of police officers to 151 per cent. Three forces reported having more devices than officers. Nineteen forces reported having sufficient devices available for less than half of their officers.
As such the NAO strongly recommended that any future service-wide investment should be based on ‘robust analysis of police force requirements, costs and their ability to use new technology effectively to optimise benefit’.
The report also highlighted particular difficulties in implementing mobile technology and achieving convergence of ICT across 43 police forces nationwide.
Amyas Morse did however acknowledge that ‘there is still opportunity to achieve value for money’. It is hoped that savings may be realised in the future as more forces utilise the technology to improve the efficiency of their processes. This would cut costs in both control room and back-office activities.
Dods Parliamentary Communications Ltd