By Andy McCue, 13 January 2004 16:00
NEWS A "major milestone" has been reached in the government's £1.2bn criminal justice IT project, with the creation of an electronic link that will join up police custody and prosecution case preparation systems.
Warwickshire is the first police force to go live with the interface, which was developed by the Police IT Organisation (PITO) and IT firm Vivista.
The government has spent £69m on custody and case preparation systems to date, with 10 case programmes and four custody programmes in operation at the end of 2003, and10 additional forces set to use the custody programmes by April 2004. A national rollout is due to be completed by April next year.
The new electronic interface will link the two systems, with the aim of cutting red tape and reducing errors by enabling police and prosecution teams to share information and allowing courts to update the Police National Computer.
Warwickshire Chief Constable John Burbeck said in a statement that the project is a "major milestone" in the modernisation of the criminal justice system.
"Once an offender is arrested, the police service provides most of the information required for the prosecution to proceed. We will now be able to ensure that that information is delivered more quickly to our partners, particularly the CPS and the Courts," he said.
Home Office Minister Hazel Blears said the technology will mean officers spend less time at the station filling out forms and more time "patrolling in our communities and tackling crime".
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1. anonymous
£1.2bn ?
Somebody saw these boys coming a mile off.
2. anonymous
In Scotland identical facilities have been in place for years, and their CJS systems were linked by end-2001. Scotland has one tenth of the English/Welsh population, but no Minister will explain why the English programme will cost 100 times the Scottish one. And this programme has been devised to maximise risk! No wonder it is already asking for more than the £1.2B announced here - the likely outturn will be over £1.5B at least: and that's leaving out the costs/risks of its constituent agency projects. The police one, for instance, already several years late,is likely to prove a potential disaster like no other.
3. anonymous
Comparisons with Scotland are misleading, as is the citing of £1.2b out of context. Much of the CJS in England and Wales has had no IT investment...ever... This cash is for 3 years and is having to go back to basics... modern electricity supplies, network cabling, PC's and THEN the COTS & bespoke applications, process work, business change, training etc - to cover organisations that employ some 350k staff .