Public Sector Roundup: Policing tech

North Yorkshire police get new content management system

GOSS has partnered up with North Yorkshire Police Authority to create a website redesign.

The project will involve using GOSS's content management system iCM, on a .NET platform. IT will also be hosted on GOSS's dedicated web servers.

The GOSS iCM solution will give North Yorkshire Police Force the power to enable multiple contributors to up-load content quickly and easily with a minimum of training, offering force-wide devolved content contribution.

Website development project coordinator at North Yorkshire Police authority Gina Allen said: "With the new system, we will be able to devolve responsibility for updates down to areas and Safer Neighbourhoods Teams meaning that the information is written by the people on the front line who really understand local priorities and needs and can update and feedback to their communities in real time."

The new system will also offer full WYSIWYG editing contribution, copying Microsoft Word and Excel-based content directly to the website, automatic discover and relationship building of related information hidden within content using GOSS iSuggestor, forum and blog management and RSS input and output control.

The new website is expected to go live in November 2008.

Cable & Wireless pens framework agreement deal with NPIA

Communications service Cable & Wireless has signed a deal with the National Policing Improvement Agency (NPIA) to equip them with mobile information solutions.

The three-year agreement will give police forces across the UK instant information when out on patrol.

The solution, which includes software and hardware, works by interfacing with force systems and applications, giving officers access to vital information while they are out on the beat. The solution runs on handheld computers and works as a functional mobile computer unit.

Using the mobile information units, police officers can input and update information, such as criminal record checks, via their mobile computers. Officers out on the beat will now have access to core operational systems, reducing the amount of time they spend at the station completing administration duties.

Chief executive officer at Cable & Wireless Jim Marsh said: "The agreement we've signed with the NPIA could revolutionise the way police work. Our mobile information solution fully meets the current requirements of the Police Service and is available to police forces today."

Local authorities to close management skills gap

Local authorities expect more help to deliver a complete service programme for the government's Transformation Agenda, according to Civica.

The survey questioned 102 local authority chief executives, policy makers and change managers across the UK and found that seven out of ten local authorities expect shared services within three years but three out of five want expert help to engineer reform.

Civica found that 34 per cent of respondents claim to have made significant progress on service transformation so far.

Meanwhile 48 per cent said that they expected to do so over the next six months, but only one in six believes that significant progress on service reform will take them a year or more.

However, there is still a feeling among local authorities that management skills needed to be improved in order to deliver transformation.

Up to 60 per cent of respondents viewed management skills training as a high or significant spending priority and 95 per cent said IT consulting and service was a high priority.