"The roll-out of mobile technology to police forces was
achieved against a tight timescale and at reasonable cost. Too
little consideration was given, however, to the need for the
devices or how they would be used. In the majority of forces, the
benefits have not so far extended beyond simply allowing officers
to spend more time out of the station.
"There is still the opportunity to achieve value for
money, though, if more forces use the technology to improve the
efficiency of their processes and make savings in their back-office
activities."
Amyas Morse, head of the National Audit Office, 27
January 2012
A programme to equip frontline police officers with mobile
devices, such as BlackBerrys and personal data assistants, has
achieved a basic level of benefits. However, as the benefits for
most forces do not extend beyond this basic level, then value for
money has not yet been achieved from the £80 million of
expenditure.
According to the National Audit Office, while in many forces
mobile devices enable officers to spend more time out of their
stations, cash savings have been limited and only one in five
forces have used the devices effectively to improve their business
and operational processes.
The business case for the Mobile Information Programme, funded
by the Home Office and managed by the National Policing Improvement
Agency under the direction of a programme board, focused upon the
swift delivery of mobile devices and, by December 2010, around
41,000 had been rolled out, considerably ahead of schedule.
Although, in reality, the Agency cannot mandate forces and has
little control over each force's investment decision, not enough
consideration was given to how forces would use the mobile
technology, how much local spending was required or how realistic
were the announced deadlines. The programme has not yet added the
ability to check fingerprints to its mobile information
devices.
The programme has on average increased the visibility of police
officers to the public and officers spend more time out of the
station, an estimated 18 minutes a shift, although there is
considerable variation. While the Mobile Information Programme did
not explicitly set out to deliver cashable savings, these should
have followed from objectives to reduce bureaucracy, increase
efficiency and contribute to better policing. Of the 32 forces
responding to an NAO survey, only ten claimed some form of cashable
savings and these are relatively minor. However, some forces are
predicting greater savings in the future, for example, by reducing
control room costs.
In some instances, process improvement aligned with the use of
mobile technology is improving efficiency and reducing bureaucracy.
Officers are using their devices to complete and submit crime and
intelligence reports and less time is spent obtaining information
from control rooms over their radios. However, 22 forces responding
to the survey cited drawbacks with mobile technology projects.
According to today's report, the experience of implementing
mobile technology reinforces the challenge of achieving convergence
of ICT across 43 police forces, each with bespoke systems
supporting individual business processes.
Publication details:
HC: 1765, 2010-2012
ISBN: 9780102975352