The police service took another step towards a more centralised approach to technology with the publication of the chief inspector of constabulary’s interim report last week.

Sir Ronnie Flanagan was commissioned in March by then- home secretary John Reid to review UK policing.

Reducing bureaucracy is a major priority, according to Sir Flanagan. And a number of his recommendations include either explicit or implicit calls for standard, national systems.

Ensuring that technology and information is compatible between the 43 independent forces is crucial, says the report.

“Too many systems are developed on a force-only basis ­ a key challenge is to ensure better co-operation in terms of inter-force operability and systems compatibility,” it says.

Flanagan is recommending the creation of minimum standards of functionality for local IT programmes and a national objective to avoid duplication of data entry.

Standard forms would also help. “While unglamorous, there is a case for generic forms that can be set nationally and adopted locally,” says the report.

“This will subsequently make the transition to a possible national technological system in the future easier and will ensure that any digital rollout of access to and production of data is that much more feasible.”

A major enabler for reducing bureaucracy, making use of generic systems and giving officers more time on the beat is the use of mobile devices such as BlackBerrys.

Many forces are already investing in the technology. But Flanagan is charging the central National Policing Improvement Agency (NPIA) with the task of identifying the costs and benefits of such schemes, and establishing the most appropriate model for service-wide rollout.

But the NPIA and any central IT strategy will face considerable challenges.

Earlier attempts to introduce standardised police technology, under the auspices of the now-defunct Police IT Organisation (Pito), are widely acknowledged to have been unsuccessful.

But police are supportive of the interoperability agenda.

“Addressing the technological aspects identified by Sir Ronnie’s review will be important in ensuring that the significant policing improvements outlined
become a reality,” said a spokesman for the Association of Police Authorities.

There is huge scope for technology to improve efficiency in the police, said Ailsa Beaton, chief information officer at the Metropolitan Police.

But the key to success is focusing on the business need, rather than the technology.

“The work the Association of Chief Police Officers and others have done has brought us to a much better place now to work together than we have ever been,” said Beaton.

“But before we jump to a technological solution we need to look at the business, and take the bureaucracy out of the processes before we look at what technology we are going to put into it,” she said.

The problem will be to establish the business case for IT investments that yield operational benefits that cannot be directly financially measured.

“The pilots we have run at the Met on mobile data show that there is absolutely no doubt we can give time back to officers, but the schemes do not pay for themselves directly, in cash terms,” said Beaton.

Any central strategy must weigh the flexibility to address local needs against the level of standardisation required to make that possible, according to Eric Woods, government practice director at analyst Ovum.

“There is always a balancing act but with modern IT systems it is trickier than ever before,” said Woods.

“Sir Ronnie’s report includes a welcome recognition of the need to fit technology with the requirements of the officers and use IT to relieve their bureaucratic burden.

“And the step to get there is to look at more standardised systems because only then can we address some of the duplication issues,” he said.

Any central plan for the police service will be following in the footsteps of the £12bn National Programme for NHS IT (NPfIT).

It will also face similar difficulties.

“NPfIT was designed to address challenges of fragmentation but has in turn thrown up issues of autonomy and flexibility at a local level,” said Woods.

Any NPIA-led schemes will have the advantage over their Pito precursors in their closer alliance with local forces’ requirements.

Senior sources in police forces say that because the NPIA is staffed and run by the police service itself, it has a better view of local priorities and more support on the ground.

Other possibilities tabled by Flanagan include standardised information systems to give a clear national view of where the £11bn policing spend is going, and use of the Airwave digital radio network to automatically keep track of officer activity.

The report also recommends expansion of the London “virtual court” pilot, which links police stations to magistrates’ courts using videoconferencing technology to allow defendants to appear in court within three hours of being charged.