BAPCO Journal - October 2018 by Echo Events

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£5.00 | October 2018 | Vol 24 Issue No 3

Connecting, Networking and Informing

THINCS a million A new app helps to assess ‘non-technical’ command skills on the fireground

Joining forces

Lincolnshire Police’s creation of a multi-organisational version of Niche

Breaking barriers

EENA talks about enabling emergency app functionality across national borders

Run, hide, tweet

Using social media to gain situational awareness during large-scale terrorist incidents

Our American cousins:

Going data-first with FirstNet

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CONTENTS

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Sub-editor: Chris Young Production director: Richard Hamshere Publisher: Paul Johnson Managing director: Jon Benson Chief executive officer: Ben Allen

Cover story 10 4 President’s address John Anthony discusses new 999 strategies 6

News round up and analysis Home Office agrees ‘phased’ ESN deployment; BAPCO charity partner announced

BAPCO Directors President: John Anthony MBE john.anthony@bapco.org.uk

Vice President: Andy Rooke andy.rooke@bapco.org.uk

16 Great minds THINCS alike A new FRS app helps to assess ‘non-technical’ skills, during training and on the fireground

Vice President: Chris Lucas chris.lucas@bapco.org.uk

Chief Executive: Ian Thompson ian.thompson@bapco.org.uk

Views expressed in this magazine do not necessarily represent those of the editor or publisher. The publisher can accept no liability for any consequential loss or damage, howsoever caused, arising from any information printed. The BAPCO Journal is delivered to members using bags made of recyclable plastic.

Taking care of the football With the UK embracing ‘incremental delivery,’ Harris County in Texas talks about FirstNet, and the use of data at the Super Bowl

20 Joining forces Lincolnshire Police discusses its creation of a multi-organisation version of Niche 24

Walls come tumbling down EENA’s efforts to enable emergency app functionality across European borders

26 A time of immense change Superintendent Lynne McCartney discusses her hopes for the move from emergency services narrowband to broadband 28 Out in the street

The CEO of Coeus Software talks about his company’s workforce mobility platform, PoliceBox

30 Run, hide, tweet The effective use of social media in the event of a large-scale terror attack 32 On with the show The Journal reports from ESS 2018 34 The centre of attention

Comment from chief executive Ian Thompson

The BAPCO Journal is published by MA Business Ltd, St. Jude’s Church, Dulwich Road, London, SE24 0PB, UK. Tel: +44 (0)20 7738 5454 Website: www.bapco.org.uk

Twitter: @BritishAPCO | www.bapco.org.uk | October 2018

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PRESIDENT’S ADDRESS

In the summer time

BAPCO president John Anthony discusses the impact of the hot weather, and how to make the 999 service more efficient

British APCO is where active members of our public safety community exchange and advise on all critical communications subjects. British APCO participates strongly in the global alliance of APCO International. British APCO’s aims include solving real-time critical communications problems, participating in research programmes (eg EU projects), showcasing technologies, and lobbying on issues such as spectrum and harmonisation. British APCO holds an annual exhibition and development event, many regional events as well as training sessions, and is respected as the UK’s (and Europe’s) leading – and only – forum of knowledge exchange and trans er s ecific to communications in public safety. o find out more details on how to contribute to and draw on this vibrant community by becoming a member, telephone 03303 327173 or email support@bapco.org.uk For more information visit www.bapco.org.uk

ell, what a summer! While most of us have been enjoying the weather many of our colleagues have been having to deal with unprecedented workloads brought about by the heat. The dry summer has brought about grass and heathland fires not seen for many years, necessitating large scale mutual aid between fire and rescue services. People enjoying our coast and rivers also put our colleagues in the MCA and RNLI to the test. And of course, any extreme in temperature over a prolonged period puts pressure on the ambulance service. While this all has an impact on each individual service there is a single, key pinch point for them all and that is the BT 999 service. 999 has seen an unprecedented sustained demand this year and has struggled at times to maintain an “We still spend excellent service to the public. This appears to be through no far too much fault of its own, but the inability of emergency service control time passing rooms to deal with the volume of calls and at the same time remain able to take the calls from BT in a timely manner. This information leads to calls having to be sent to ‘buddy’ control rooms, and between control BT operators having to manage stressed callers which is not rooms by their role. All of this inevitability leads to a poorer service to the public and contributes to longer attendance times. telephone, thereby The root cause of the problem is multifaceted, and can no tying up valuable doubt be linked to budgets, staffing levels, extreme weather resources” and so on. However, I believe that there is much more that we within the emergency services and critical communications industry can do to relieve the problems by making the 999 call handling system more efficient. Surprisingly there remain a number of control rooms not using the EISEC facility to obtain caller subscriber information. The technology for obtaining Advance Mobile Location (AML) is available for control rooms to identify the location of mobile callers to within a few metres. In addition, we all still spend far too much time passing information between control rooms by telephone, tying up valuable resources who could be answering calls from members of the public. This could be solved through the introduction of technological solutions such as MAIT. It would be very easy to demand greater resources from our funding departments to deal with the issue, but I don’t believe we can until we embrace all that is available and are seen to have adopted best practice. So, my challenge to both industry and those responsible for emergency service control rooms is to embrace the technology that is available today and develop further technological solutions to the problem. Every control room should be utilising EISEC and have a roadmap for the introduction of AML and MAIT. That way we will be able to provide a better service and much improved working conditions for those working within control rooms. I would encourage everyone to engage at our conferences, put forward your conference papers and demonstrate the technologies that will enable us to continue to serve the public, no matter what the British weather throws at us!

John Anthony, MBE, President, BAPCO 4

Twitter: @BritishAPCO | www.bapco.org.uk | October 2018

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INDUSTRY NEWS

technology and video/thermal imaging. Regarding the aforementioned robots, Horiba MIRA’s groundbased solution can not only climb up and down stairs but it is also able to recognise signs and symbols warning of hazardous chemicals which may be located in the vicinity. Snake Eyes by Autonomous Devices/ Pendar, meanwhile, is a hybrid air and ground vehicle optimised for use in confined spaces, and able to relay 3D images – and detect chemical agents – using a compact laser system. Speaking of the trials, Peter Stockel, DSTL’s autonomy lead, said: “These two weeks of trials saw the culmination of more than 18 months of work to realise an exciting vision. “This could see robots and humans working together with each other in demanding situations and potentially save lives when dealing with incidents involving hazardous substances.

FireServiceColleg

Trials of drones weighing less than a bar of soap – as well as robots which have the ability to climb stairs – have taken place at the Fire Service College in Gloucestershire. The devices were tested in simulated ‘contaminated’ scenarios, with the aim of anticipating both United Kingdom and homeland and battlefield environments. The exercise compared speed and accuracy of the units against that of human response teams. The trials took place in September as part of the Ministry of Defence and Home Office-backed Project Minerva, which aims to reduce the risk to emergency services and frontline troops attending operations involving hazardous chemical or biological materials. They were supported by specialist Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) personnel, as well as the military, police and fire services. Technology tested at the event was provided by a range of manufacturers, all of which had previously submitted designs for approval by the project. Solutions on display at the event included BMT Defence Services’ gas-sensing unmanned aerial vehicle, alongside Loughborough University’s SceneSEARCH 250-gram nano drone, which also possesses gas-sensing

e ©Crown cop yright 2018

Project Minerva robot tech tested at Fire Service College

We’ve been working with industry and academia to rapidly advance robotic and autonomous solutions to enhance our response options and tools for the near future.” He continued: “With continued involvement across government – and also demonstration with the user community – we aim to mature this emergent capability to test the ‘art of the possible’ and accelerate this into the hands of the prospective users for further operational evaluation, both for MoD and the Home Office.” Project Minerva has received more than £3 million in joint funding over the course of two years.

BAPCO charity partner announced BAPCO has entered into a two-year partnership with charity Embrace Child Victims of Crime. The relationship will see BAPCO fundraising for the organisation, for instance at events and through corporate donations. The money raised will be used to help children in the UK affected by serious crime, in particular enabling them to access specialist counselling as well as practical support to help them cope with trauma.

Speaking of the relationship, Embrace Child Victims of Crime chief executive Anne Campbell said: “I am absolutely delighted that British APCO has agreed to accept Embrace as its charity of choice over the next two years. “[The association] reaches right across the law enforcement and public safety sector, and will not only help us raise much-needed funds to support some of the most vulnerable children in our communities, but also raise our

profile among professionals working directly with such children. “The partnership means that even more children will be able to benefit from the services which we provide.” BAPCO chief executive Ian Thompson said: “British APCO works to improve emergency services and public safety communications and information technology across the UK, to protect lives. Embrace CVOC improves the lives of children affected in

these circumstances. It seems a perfect fit.” Embrace CVOC was established as the Child Victims of Crime charity in 1993 by police officers in Cheshire following the terrorist attack in Warrington, in which two children were killed. It has since gone on to help more than 20,000 children affected by crime, as well as their immediate families across the United Kingdom, as well as in the Channel Islands and Isle of Man.

October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

INDUSTRY NEWS

In other news

UK government pledges more police tech funding The UK government has announced the latest round of Police Transformation Fund awards, pledging to hand out around £100m to help forces improve their use of digital technology. According to the Home Office, up to £70m of the money will be invested across 2018/19 in four major national policeled programmes. These consist of the ‘national enabling’ and ‘specialist capabilites’ programmes, as well as the digital policing portfolio and ‘transforming forensics’. Speaking of the fund, the then-minister for policing and the fire service Nick Hurd said: “Criminals don’t stand still, and neither should our police forces. “The Police Transformation Fund is delivering real change in policing, and this new funding will continue to help forces improve efficiency and tackle threats like

serious and organised crime.” In other Home Office news, the department has announced its plan to “migrate” and “upgrade” core national police systems from traditional, onpremises data centres to Amazon Web Services’ public cloud. Published at the end of August, the tender document – which was issued to help find an IT partner – read: “The Police Open Systems currently reside in a traditional data centre and provide extended capability to police forces on top of the services provided by the Police National Computer (PNC). “The software and infrastructure on which these systems reside is not of a satisfactory status or versioning, and as such there is a desire to migrate these systems to Amazon Web Services.”

APD displays emergency services tapestry APD Communications has created a work of art to commemorate the job carried out by its clients in the emergency services. The Tapestry of the Emergency Services is 6ft by 4ft. It consists of 64 pegs, each of which is associated with a meaningful word to describe those working in public safety. It comes to life by wrapping four colours of thread – red, blue, yellow and green – around the pegs to represent each of the individual UK emergency services. Speaking of the piece, Rhiannon Beeson, APD marketing and sales Manager, said: “The tapestry board is an attractive way of showing how people feel about the emergency services. In a world of digital content, it’s nice to create something that’s based on a traditional craft.” The launch venue for the work is the Centre for Digital Innovation (C4DI) tech hub in APD’s home city of Hull.

Drone clinches cannabis conviction Lincolnshire Police has secured its first prosecution obtained using footage from a drone. The evidence was used in the case of Mark Lovell, who was jailed earlier this year for three years for producing cannabis. Lovell’s cannabis farm was discovered following searches carried out by the force’s drone team, taking place in October 2017. Speaking of the operation, Inspector Ed Delderfield said: “We had received information that this man was potentially growing cannabis, and we knew that he had done so before.

Twitter: @BritishAPCO | www.bapco.org.uk | October 2018

“Where he lived was surrounded by trees and bushes, so it was actually like a compound. Our intelligence officers spoke with our drone operators and asked if thermal imaging could help – we agreed this could work and started our operation at 2am one morning.” He continued: “We turned up and flew the drone about 400 feet across an open field, before hovering 50 metres from the property. The heat source was obvious and we scrolled through our different filters to highlight the ‘heat’ in a number of spectrums. The filming from the drone took one minute and 20

seconds, and it was only in the air for five minutes from start to finish.” Lincolnshire Police currently has two drones with thermal imaging capability, as well as 10 people to operate the devices. The team was also recently involved in the search for a teenage girl who rang 999 to report that she had been raped. According to reports, the girl in question – who was unable to identify her exact location – was identified in minutes from the air. More on the work being carried out by Lincolnshire Police can be found on page 20.

NEWS EXTRA

Home Office agrees “phased” ESN deployment strategy The situation around the Emergency Services Network is becoming increasingly clear, as Motorola Solutions and the Home Office officially announce the project’s next phase

he Home Office has reached an agreement with Motorola Solutions for the ‘new direction’ of the Emergency Services Network, as detailed in a statement released by the latter organisation in September. According to the company, the agreement - which will see an extension for Motorola to the end of 2024 - is to allow for a “new phased deployment strategy” necessary to comprehensively roll-out the programme. The statement also gives details of a planned extension until December 31 2022 (on “substantially similar terms”) of the current UK emergency services communications system, Airwave. The agreement to carry on with the TETRA-based solution is expected to be completed later this year, with the Home Office also having the option to extend its use beyond the date quoted above if necessary. Speaking of these developments, a spokesperson for Motorola said: “The ESN agreement [ensures] that public safety organisations will benefit from the new network’s capabilities as soon as possible. [It means that they] will be able to roll out the capabilities of ESN at their desired pace, while

2022

The date on which the Airwave extension ends

maintaining the Airwave network service to ensure uninterrupted service.” Executive vice president, services and software at Motorola Solutions, Kelly Mark said: “We are proud to support the Home Office on its new delivery approach for ESN while at the same time he ome fice is ursuing an ‘incremental’ a roach to ensuring public safety users have the Airwave In addition to the PTT the air to ground/aircraft communications network they solution to be provided by communications system need. We have been working Motorola Solutions (see aspect of ESN. closely with the Home Office below), products for ESN According to the PIN, to ensure that our services will also include a package of the notice has been issued are aligned with this new telephone, messaging and data following a “reassessment” of phased deployment and services, and an air to ground technical options by ESMCP, in timeline for ESN.” communications app. the light of “previous market The new strategic direction As part of its delivery engagement, and evolution for the programme consists of user services for the of the ESN programme.” The of an ‘incremental’ approach, programme, Motorola will government now wishes to which the Home Office has implement Kodiak Networks share this learning with the said will mean that: “Police, technology to provide market, as well as seeking fire and rescue services, 3GPP standards-based feedback “around the ambulance services and other push-to-talk (PTT) software integration of PTT solutions users will be able to use data solution. Kodiak Networks, with standard commercial-offservices over the network was acquired by Motorola the-shelf (COTS) equipment from early next year, with Solutions in 2017. currently used in aircraft.” voice capabilities following The ESN Assure product The notice adds that soon after.” It closely matches meanwhile, which provides ESMCP anticipates launching the approach that was automated information on the procurement by the previously discussed at the network coverage will be end of 2018. The estimated BAPCO Satellite Series event delivered by the end of this date of publication of the in Edinburgh back in June. year. This was stated by Philip contract - which is valued at The Home Office adds Rutnam at a meeting of the an estimated £50 million - is that this approach will also Public Accounts Committee in 31 October 2018. allow the emergency services October. to test and choose which ESN In other ESN-related products they want as they news, the Home Office become available, rather than has published a prior The estimated value of the having to wait for the network information notice (PIN) ESN A2G tender to be fully implemented. regarding procurement of

£50m

October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

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October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

MISSION CRITICAL BROADBAND

Taking care of the football With the UK embracing 'incremental delivery,' Philip Mason talks to Harris County Public Safety Technology Services CTO Shing Lin about FirstNet, and the use of data at events such as the Super Bowl Why did Harris County [which is in Texas] choose to be involved with the FirstNet first-builder programme?

Primarily because we wanted to address some of the communications issues that we saw in relation to things like Hurricane Ike, back in 2008. When you look at pictures from that time, there are some really tragic images of these congested 10-lane highways with ambulances on the side of the road trying to figure out who had heat exhaustion. You can tell that the communications system really wasn’t everything that it needed to be in that situation. In terms of the network itself, the vision was essentially led by our chief information officer. At the time, FirstNet didn’t exist as an agency – it was still under the auspices of the SCC – and we worked with the State of Texas to try and gain permission to build out a pilot network. The initial impetus was around everyday emergency response, but then you start thinking about things like the Super Bowl, and it was a natural fit for those situations as well.

What communication problems do you ultimately want to solve through the use of the network? How has the new broadband technology been beneficial so far?

There are a couple of central challenges that we’re having to deal with when it comes to our current [country-wide, emergency services narrowband] P25 technology. The first is simply how limited narrowband is in terms of what it can do. Obviously the technology is great when it comes to mission-critical pushto-talk, but we now want the opportunity to exploit the use of data as well, which we’re primarily doing at the moment through sending messages. The other challenge is interoperability and how difficult it is for jurisdictions to communicate with each other. Obviously P25 is a standard which radios will work across, but that still doesn’t take into account things like administrative overheads. FirstNet won’t solve that, but – as indicated above – it will give us the opportunity to expand what we can do within those parameters. As with everything when it comes to public safety communications, it’s a matter of continual evolution.

To what degree are people disappointed with FirstNet’s current lack of mission-critical PTT functionality? The initial wave of interest, certainly, was centred around ‘When can we put push-to-talk on top of it?’. While there is voice functionality available, we quickly realised that PTT on the phone doesn’t match the experience of using a traditional radio, which it would have to do

Twitter: @BritishAPCO | www.bapco.org.uk | October 2018

MISSION CRITICAL BROADBAND

to be viable. I think people understand that, particularly with things such as the MCPTT plug testing still taking place.

two decades of the process being refined – as well as a lot of grant programmes.

What difficulties have you had to overcome regarding the use of data between first-responders?

Is there the equivalent on FirstNet of a single operational platform, as represented in regard to ESN by Motorola Solutions’ ‘user services’?

I think the fundamental problem is that organisations aren’t necessarily mature enough in the use of technology to really exploit this incredible amount of bandwidth that’s now available to them. That’s the rub right now. As I mentioned, we’re enabling people to message each other, something which has already proved invaluable because it’s allowed us to communicate between organisations. At the same time, public safety’s also waiting for the next major storm or disaster to see how the network will hold up under those conditions. There’s still a certain amount of trust which has to be earned, particularly given how comfortable people are with P25. There’s also the standards conversation, which we’re really just starting to have now. Vendors clearly want to put [forward] their own technology – much of which is proprietary – while end-users are afraid of lock-in. Saying that, regarding something like email, there must be 100 apps, all of which work with each other no matter what the device is.

Given the disparate nature of public safety in the US – for instance, in terms of jurisdiction, volunteer rather than full-time personnel and so on – how are you addressing issues such as device roll-out?

That’s definitely one of the challenges when it comes to adoption of the system, and because these are all independent agencies, we really don’t get to dictate very much in terms of what they should do. Essentially what we’ve done so far when it comes to planned events is have a cache of FirstNet-compatible devices of our own, which we then loan out. Typically, there’s no smart handsets rolled out by individual agencies, so what some first-responders are doing is signing up to FirstNet on their personal devices.

No. FirstNet/AT&T are in the process of developing an app store, with standards evolving from there, but there is no – for instance – single messaging platform. Anyone can upload to the store, as long as they’ve gone through the verification process. Again, there are clear issues in relation to interoperability around that, which brings us back to the question of standardisation. Ultimately I think we’ll see one of two things – either everyone uses the same thing, or we all come up with shared priorities when it comes to functionality. The first option isn’t realistic, because the environment’s just too complicated. So, user organisations will just have to drive the standards themselves, regardless of the platform.

Are you optimistic about that?

I am, in that we have a lot of really smart, motivated people. On the other hand, when First responders have the opportunity to use their own devices

That’s a very different model from the planned Emergency Services Network deployment in the UK… You have to give credit to FirstNet in the way that they’ve thought about this, enabling the opportunity for what’s known as extended secondary users. Personal phones won’t have primary priority on the network, but they can still access the bandwidth on a bespoke mission-critical system. In terms of where we go from here, that will only really become apparent as the system starts to mature and more people start to adopt it. It’s likely that the large metro areas such as New York will be quicker to leverage the technology across its agencies. Thinking again about P25, most people now have the devices, but that’s something which has only occurred over

"We're enabling people to message, which has been invaluable because its allowed us to communicate between organisations" 12

October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

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MISSION CRITICAL BROADBAND

October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

MISSION CRITICAL BROADBAND

What communication problems do you ultimately want to solve through the use of the network? How has the new broadband technology been beneficial so far?

Twitter: @BritishAPCO | www.bapco.org.uk | October 2018

MISSION CRITICAL BROADBAND

to be viable. I think people understand that, particularly with things such as the MCPTT plug testing still taking place.

two decades of the process being refined – as well as a lot of grant programmes.

What difficulties have you had to overcome regarding the use of data between first-responders?

Is there the equivalent on FirstNet of a single operational platform, as represented in regard to ESN by Motorola Solutions’ ‘user services’?

Are you optimistic about that?

I am, in that we have a lot of really smart, motivated people. On the other hand, when First responders have the opportunity to use their own devices

"We're enabling people to message, which has been invaluable because its allowed us to communicate between organisations" 12

October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

MISSION CRITICAL BROADBAND

you have a lot of smart, motivated people, the process can get complicated because of the number of different voices that want to be involved in the conversation.

What’s the take-up been so far in Harris County in terms of business-as-usual operations? In terms of daily operations, the uptake has honestly been pretty slow, but again that’s to do with economic considerations as much as anything else. We have around 10,000 potential users on the law enforcement side alone. At the moment departments such as the SWAT team are using it on a daily basis, but that’s not typical. From the technology side, we’re basically focusing on smaller pockets because they’re a lot easier to manage, and they have a very defined use-case. They’re almost like lead users at this point

How has FirstNet been used during the larger planned events which you mentioned?

It’s been a process of gradually rolling it out and tweaking as we go. About three years ago, we saw an opportunity to test drive the functionality at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, which gets something like 120,000 people a day for 20 days. That involved a lot of different agencies, which we were able to help communicate with one another. When we got the agreement to be a first builder, one of our key learning conditions was in relation to special events. We fed that learning back into FirstNet, in lieu of paying for the spectrum.

How did you put the broadband functionality to use during Super Bowl LI [which took place at the NRG Stadium in Houston in 2017]?

In the first instance, we became embedded with the comms people themselves. We basically started to ask questions about what they

wanted to achieve – while taking mission-critical PTT out of the equation, other than in relation to P25. Working with Houston Police Department as the primary responding agent, we then put together messaging groups according to how they wanted to run the command post. For instance, we realised that it wasn’t appropriate to give officers on patrol access to the technology, because we didn’t want them to be constantly looking down at their phone. At the same time, it’s ideal for people working undercover, because everyone’s texting all the time anyway. We started working on the communications for the Super Bowl about two years in advance, simply because it’s such a huge, high-profile event.

Could you give an example of an operational benefit in that specific context? There was one case where we were looking for a guy who’d been driving around the fan experience area numerous times, in a way that the police thought was quite suspicious. His main identifying feature was that he was wearing a red hat, which isn’t really that helpful if all you’ve got in terms of communication is P25. Using the messaging technology, they were able to circulate the licence plate, which in turn enabled officers to grab a picture off of his driving licence and disseminate that. It turned out there was already a warrant on him, and we picked him up as he was waiting in line for autographs. We used a secure, non-emergency services app, called Moxtra. It allowed us to create group directories on the fly, add and subtract users, and so on. Everything we needed, in other words.

The emergency services used data to communicate during the Super Bowl

October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

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October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

FIRE AND RESCUE SERVICE

Great minds THINCS alike

Philip Mason talks to the ex-firefighter responsible for a new app designed to help assess ‘non-technical skills’ during training or on the fireground

Adobe Stock/thanarak

Twitter: @BritishAPCO | www.bapco.org.uk | October 2018

here are, broadly speaking, two types of skillset pertaining to those who work on the front line in the Fire and Rescue Service. The first of these is made up of abilities which are entirely specific to the task at hand, the majority of which will have been acquired in a very particular and directed learning environment. These include – for instance, for a firefighter – being able to correctly use an aerial ladder, or, for an incident commander, understanding the safest way to extricate an injured passenger from the wreck of a car, and so on. At the same time, however, there is also a core of much less ‘technical’ attributes that are necessary to govern behaviour during an incident, without which the more specific skills would likely count for very little. These generally tend to be a bit more abstract, and relate to ‘life skills’ such as leadership, confidence, and the ability to be make decisions. While both are vital, the latter has only just started to become an area of focus for the FRS, at least when it comes to training incident commanders. This is due – at least in part – to the efforts of Phil Butler, a former LFB firefighter who started to introduce the concept of ‘non-technical skills’ while working as incident command trainer and manager for the brigade in the early 2000s. Retired since 2015, Butler has maintained his focus on this area of incident commander skilling, most recently through an ongoing PhD research project funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, undertaken at Cardiff University. More pertinent to readers of the BAPCO Journal, however, is that – working in collaboration with developer MyOxygen – he has also designed an app that not only helps assess these skills in real time, but also offers the potential opportunity to share learning across brigades. It is called THe INcident Command Skills app, or THINCS. Discussing how his interest in non-technical skills evolved, Butler says: “As part of my training role at London Fire Brigade, I did some research into how other sectors prepared their staff to respond in emergency situations. One of the big things I came across was ‘crew resource management’, which is the term that the aviation industry uses for teaching its air crew these kind of so-called soft skills.” He continues: “It is important to ensure that non-technical skills training like crew resource management is having the desired effects on behaviour. So, behavioural marker systems were developed to measure their performance and the aviation industry has been using them for years. Such systems refer to a set of pre-agreed and researched attributes. The skills in question invariably revolve around safety and efficiency, and in particular

FIRE AND RESCUE SERVICE

the reduction of human error, which is why the training was introduced in the first place. They first began to look at it in the light of certain air crashes which couldn’t be explained by any kind of technical malfunction.” According to Butler, as well as in the aviation sector there are also similar systems being used elsewhere, for instance in the training and monitoring of surgeons, as well as those managing offshore oil installations. Each environment, he says, requires a unique set of capabilities; for instance, the decision-making behaviours for a pilot aren’t necessarily the same as someone perfoming a medical operation. Discussing how the principles of these systems can been transferred to the fireground, he says: “Regarding the Fire and Rescue Service, we have what’s known as command skills, which consist of things such as assertiveness, safe leadership, effective decisionmaking and planning, and situational awareness. These skills were formalised in collaboration with the National Fire Chiefs Council.” Observations against the command skills are logged using the app, specifically in relation to the performance of incident commanders during assessments, training exercises and in the course of an actual shout. The app allows the observations to be reviewed and an incident commander’s performance to be rated. As well as the assessment and review functions, the app can be used to provide feedback in real time, during what Butler refers to as a “hot debrief” at the end of an incident.

Simple storage

The app was developed by aforementioned company MyOxygen, the director of which is Andy Farmer. On the design process, he says: “We used our standard development method, which basically involves workshops with the customer, drafting use-case documents and so on.” He continues: “We used wireframing to mock up how the interface would hang together, which again enabled the client to get Firefighters require many skills, both ‘technical’ and ‘non-technical’

bit more of a feel for it. We also mocked up screen designs so they could see what the app would end up looking like, which I think they appreciated. We basically wanted to go with an as iterative approach as possible, so they could see it and try it out for themselves.” According to Farmer, in terms of specific technical requirements, Butler wanted the solution to be Android-based because that is what most fire and rescue services currently using data are rolling out to the front line. Particular features for dyslexic users were also specified, such as colour coding associated with certain types of commands. Speaking of this in particular, Farmer says: “There’s a marked difference between a consumer app, which people tend to download through their own volition, and something which you’re told to use at work. We needed to make it something that people didn’t mind using.” In terms of storage and subsequent use, once the assessment has taken place, the data is simply exported from the app via a CSV file, which in turn enables it to be displayed as a spreadsheet. While not exactly what you’d refer to a flashy, this clearly makes the information easy to both keep and share via an email to the administrator address. The THINCS solution – which is currently at its MVP (minimum viable product) stage – has so far been rolled out to seven fire and rescue services around the UK, including South Wales, Tyne and Wear, and the Scottish FRS. According to Butler, however, while the demonstration process might still be ongoing, it is also necessary to start planning for the future, in particular on how the information might be disseminated across the service going forward. “There is no collaborative aspect between the seven services at this point, over and above them sharing all their data with me,” he says. “But it’s certainly conceivable that they could collate the learning in-house and then make it available to the wider service. They could generate some really interesting data for themselves, but sharing it is not something the app can do in its own right.” Butler elaborates on this by discussing the Joint Organisational Learning initiative, which is a cornerstone of the Joint Emergency Services Interoperability Principles (JESIP). “It would be lovely if, in the years to come, the solution could be used to disseminate information about command skills,” he says. “There’s got to be uptake of the system first though, so we just need to capitalise on the progress we’ve made so far.” As readers of the Journal will know, the UK emergency services are currently being transformed by a stream of innovations, being made possible by wireless broadband technology. The THINCS app is just the sort of thing to help build this brave new world.

October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

Giving you confidence when communication is critical

Mason Advisory is an independent consultancy that matches technology know-how with commercial and business sense. For over 20 years, organisations across the public sector have trusted our consultants to support their most critical projects. Blue-light organisations share some key challenges around resilience, cost reduction, and data management and security. Our team has provided advice and assurance for major programmes around the world, including here in the UK, Norway,

the Caribbean and Hong Kong, focussing on critical mobile communications, command and control, digital data and storage, and information security. We continue as a key part of in the Home Office Delivery Partner team for the GBP1 billion Emergency Services Mobile Communications Programme. We advise on all aspects of public-safety communications, including fixed and wireless voice and data networks, control room and technologies.

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October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

MULTI-AGENCY

Joining forces in the East Midlands The BAPCO Journal talks to Lincolnshire Police about its creation of a single, multi-organisation version of Niche via its Digital Futures project

ritish policing is increasingly using digital communications technology to help make its business processes more efficient in the light of ongoing funding cuts. As readers of the BAPCO Journal will know, the most widespread current use of this kind of tech is probably in relation to what we might term ‘mobile workflow management’, exemplified by Motorola Solutions’ Pronto product, which the company refers to in its marketing material as an ‘e-note book’. (For an in-depth look at this kind of platform – albeit one produced by a rival manufacturer – have a look at our future tech section on page 28). Alongside these, however, there are also other solutions being developed and rolled out at a seemingly ever-increasing rate, many of which are predicated around even more specific operational functions. These range from products enabling officers to take digital fingerprints in order to instantly cross-reference and identify suspects, to augmented reality control rooms that can be carried around in a briefcase. As disparate as these solutions may seem, they all have two major things in common. The first is the way in which they remove the need for officers to physically transport information from one location to the next, thereby keeping them on the streets and out of the station. The other is the level of advance planning required to successfully incorporate them into business as usual policing. This is currently the case in Lincolnshire which, in collaboration with several other UK forces, is in the process of using digital comms to transform the organisation from top to bottom, via its Technology Futures programme.

Into the future

The story of the programme began about a year ago when Lincolnshire decided to bring all of its technology/R&D work – including that which would have traditionally sat only with IT – under the auspices of a single department. This included more operationally focused solutions such as drones and body-worn video, all the way through to its planned adoption of Microsoft Office 365. The idea behind this, according to chief sponsor of Technology Futures ACO Andrew White, was essentially to align a number of

Twitter: @BritishAPCO | www.bapco.org.uk | October 2018

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projects towards a single purpose. This in turn was reflected in the subsequent involvement of several other forces in the project, three of which are now using the same mobile working app (Pronto), while all six are linked to each other’s back-office RMS systems. Giving an overview of this, White says: “The prompt for getting the project under way was basically our move to mobile data via the Motorola product. Clearly, that gives operational advantages in terms of officers in the field, but the real benefit is how we’ve been able to connect with different forces around the country, for instance in relation to a single version of [records management platform] Niche. “The other forces involved include Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Northamptonshire and Leicestershire, as well as City of London, with whom we can now share intelligence about financial crime. Between us, we possess what is in essence the largest single records management system in the UK, with Lincs hosting and providing guidance across the other six forces. We’ve become what I would call a reasonably sized power broker in the Minerva/Niche family, across the whole of the country.” Discussing the rationale of the Technology Futures programme as a whole, he continues: “Every decision we now make is done with an eye on what the implications for other systems might be, and what it might do in terms of replacing or complementing what we already have. We’re operating in a much more joined-up way across all departments, because they all have a stake in the roll-out of digital technology and the interoperability it offers.” Going back to the subject of the initial 2015 mobile data roll-out, the first wave saw smart devices being issued to all constables, as well as sergeants involved in daily operational activities. This was followed two years later with a second phase, with devices going to PCSOs, special constables as well as specialist departments who received a variety of different devices – for instance, tablets – depending on their operational requirements. The deployment has consisted of around 830 Samsung Galaxy Note 4s, which the force is apparently looking to upgrade to the Note 8. Because the devices are personal issue they have – according to White – been treated incredibly well by their recipients, with only two damaged in the space of four years. As indicated above, the primary purpose of the deployment was to keep officers out in the community where they can do

el Verdeta

One of the main tourist attractions in the county of Lincolnshire, the seaside town of Skegness is located on the coast in the East Lindsey district of the county. According to figures released in 2016, it receives around four and a half million visitors annually. Amongst other claims to fame, it was the site of the first Butlins holiday camp which opened in 1936. It has many nicknames, including Costa del Skeg, Skegvegas, as well as ‘the Blackpool of the East Coast.’

most good, rather than stranding them behind a desk back at the station wading through a sea of paperwork. Illustrating just how beneficial this has been, White mentions in particular the former process around road traffic collisions (RTCs), which he describes as “an incredibly bureaucratic area of police work”. “Traditionally, officers dispatched to the scene of an RTC would have to take a 10-page book with them,” he says. “They’d have to fill in any number of details, including the vehicles and people involved, interviews carried out, Department for Transport information and so on. Once the book was complete it would have to come back to the police station, then into the internal mail to the collisions unit, who would manually transfer all of that data onto our back-office system, which would then be accessible to the officer in charge. “When we attend an RTC now, all the information is captured on a single device and immediately synced to our management system. The system also has the ability to recognise the type of information being inputted, and make the decision in certain cases whether or not to initiate a prosecution. Our RTC department has shrunk from nine members of staff to three since we started the project.” Adobe Stock/Gabri

Skegness: a beginner’s guide

Everyone’s connected

According to White, the integration of everyday operational processes with digital communications has signified a step-change in how the force goes about its business. Needless to say, however, this hasn’t happened without a considerable amount of forward planning, both around the solutions themselves as well as logistical details such as budgets. As might be imagined, one of the most complicated aspects of the project has been enabling multiple forces to gain access to each other’s back-end. Again, this relates to the technology being rolled out, but is also in regard to ingrained cultural barriers that for so long have stopped forces from organising as efficiently as the public might expect. Discussing why it was important for Lincolnshire and the forces around it to take the initiative on this, White says: “Our partners in the project are connected to each other in a lot of ways, primarily due to location, so it was really just a natural thing to pursue. For instance, if we think about the summer months, we see a large influx of visitors trying to get to the beach at Skegness, many of whom will be using roads which go across several different force areas. We’re essentially now

October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

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receiving live crime occurance data about what’s happening across the East Midlands, which we never could have done before. “At the same time, our relationship with a force such as City of London – which has a national portfolio for fraud – proves that you don’t necessarily need to be geographically linked. The first person arrested by them following their golive with Niche in November, for instance, was already known to us, having been previously arrested in our county. They now have access to our complete intelligence profile and vice versa, which again opens up any number of options from an operational point of view.” On the planning aspect itself, meanwhile, White says Lincs has now put a team in place to both scan the horizon in terms of future tech as well as manage the potential changes which that technology might bring. A key to this, he says, is the comparatively small size of the organisation itself, enabling closer collaboration between departments and therefore greater adaptability. This has in turn enabled the operations side to describe what they want, with IT subsequently in charge of development, rather than the other way around (or to put it in White’s words: “We don’t just want a great gadget”). With that in mind, what does he believe are the greatest challenges and opportunities lurking around the corner? What will UK policing look like in five years’ time, as officers become increasingly conversant with digital technology? Answering the first question, he says: “We’ve obviously had to plan for the Emergency Services Network, which to us has the

potential to be a crucial piece of kit, providing any number of new opportunities. At the same time, the uncertainty around the project does leave us in an interesting position when it comes to our current MNO contract, which runs out in 2019. Obviously we can’t make any assessments because the review has been ongoing, but if data is accessible first we’re clearly going to have to use two devices.” He continues: “In terms of where we’ll be over the next few years, the next thing we’re looking at is giving our mobile data units a command function with a much stronger link to our control centre, which we’re also replacing very soon. We’re also really interested in making the mobile unit into the sole computing tool for officers, both on the beat and in stations.” The other fascinating thing that White mentions in terms of the project’s future direction is a desire to link up with even more forces around the country, again through the use of Pronto as a hosted solution. “If we look at our northern border, which we share with Humberside,” he says, “there’s no reason why our two versions of Pronto can’t talk to each other in the same way we’ve done across the Midlands with Niche. It’s a viable option, and we’ve put the question to Motorola.” This would have huge implications, not just for Lincolnshire but for UK policing as a whole. The Technology Futures programme has transformed business as usual policing

Twitter: @BritishAPCO | www.bapco.org.uk | October 2018

EMERGENCY APPS

Walls come tumbling down

lot of discussion is currently taking place – not least within the pages of the BAPCO Journal – about the anticipated advantages that broadband will represent for frontline responders. Naturally, much of this, at least in the UK, has focused on the Emergency Services Network with its promise of missioncritical video, increased situational awareness and so on. At the same time, however, smart devices are also likely to be increasingly important in regard to the public contacting control rooms in the event of an emergency. This is something that is reflected in BAPCO’s app accreditation work, which plays a core role in ensuring standardisation prior to direct connection with the 999 system. Applications which have gone through the process so far include REALRIDER, which enables motorcyclists to automatically contact the emergency services in the event of an accident. While a considerable amount of work is being carried out in the UK, however, effort is also being exerted across the Channel to make the 999/112 app environment fit for purpose. A high-profile effort in this area is being carried out by EENA (the European Emergency Number Association), in the form of its cross-border Pan-European Mobile Emergency Apps (PEMEA) strategy.

Safety as a basic right

Discussing the PEMEA project in a press release published in September, EENA explains the rationale for it in this way: “In a Europe where people travel more and more, a problem remains: an app from country X does not work in country Y. The four freedoms of the EU are freedom of movement of people, goods, services and capital. Could we please add safety as the 5th?” The statement continues: “PEMEA is a technical architecture that allows emergency apps to interconnect with each other. As a result, an app from one country can be operational in another [meaning that the app will serve users anywhere in Europe]. PEMEA is not new – it is already a European Standard. But there is distance between theory and practice.” One of the leads on the project is EENA’s technical director Cristina Lumbreras. She explains the ongoing cross-border

The REALRIDER app automatically alerts the control roo

difficulties as primarily being a matter of the app servers in different countries not being able to interconnect with each other. This has been remedied through interfaces developed by Beta 80 Group and Deveryware following the standard, which provide what she refers to as a “subprotocol” across what in effect will become an international network. Elaborating on this while also providing an overview of the project’s background, she says: “We explored many ideas to begin with, for example, having a centralised server in each country. We quickly realised that this would be quite difficult to achieve from a political perspective.” She continues: “What we came up with in the end was essentially a unified way to exchange data, as formalised in ETSI’s TS 103 478 standardisation document, which was published earlier this year. “Without wanting to simplify too much, this means that the message fields are standardised so everyone can receive the information in the same fashion. Once PEMEA is implemented, if I – for example – use a French app in Belgium, I will be “Having a speaking with the Belgian 112 center and centralised server in each the data will arrive to the Belgian app server. country would Today, the data will end up at the French app server and will never be available for the be politically Belgian emergency services.” too difficult”

October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

Adobe Stock/adcdsb

The BAPCO Journal talks to EENA about its ongoing efforts to facilitate 999 app functionality across international borders

EMERGENCY APPS

Plethora of apps

According to the aforementioned press release, numerous apps have already signed up to the programme. These include locating solutions Zachranka from the Czech Republic and Where Are You from Italy. There are also three representatives from Spain, which Lumbreras says is particularly challenging as a country, due to the fact that certain apps can’t even function between individual regions let alone across international borders. Discussing the rationale behind choosing those solutions in particular, she says: “None of the countries or regions really have anything in common from a technical point of view, other than the fact that the applications are at a stage where they can actually be downloaded and used by the general public. “The actual technical make-up of the solutions themselves don’t really interest us beyond their ability to talk to each other. We launched the product at the EENA conference in April and received so many applications that we had to make a choice about what to prioritise.” She continues: “In terms of the content itself, the core functionality has always been

Twitter: @BritishAPCO | www.bapco.org.uk | October 2018

“What we came up with was essentially a unified way to exchange data”

to help make it easier to locate the caller. In some countries the accuracy of this location has traditionally been quite poor, with an up to five kilometre level of inaccuracy in some cases, so the creation of a data connection through the use of an app has been vital. “There are now other apps available as well, for instance for people who have difficulty hearing or speaking but who still need to contact the emergency services. We’re really just at the beginning of the journey.” Regarding the latter kind of app in particular, one example developed specifically in the UK is TapSOS which, as Lumbreras suggests, provides a non-verbal method of contact for people with disabilities. Recently featured in the BAPCO Journal, the solution also won the Digital Health Award at the Tech4Good Awards earlier this year. On the rationale behind the app, TapSOS founder and CEO Becca Hume says: “The solution is basically intended for use by anyone who isn’t able to ring the emergency services. “That could be because of a physical issue such as being deaf or hard of hearing, or because the person is in a difficult situation where they don’t feel that it’s safe to speak. For instance, it’s becoming increasingly the case during terror attacks – such as the recent one on Borough Market – that those involved need to hide and remain silent.” Like REALRIDER, TapSOS has gone through the BAPCO app accredition process. For all EENA’s good work, BAPCO is the only organisation in Europe that tests and verifies that an app is suitable for emergency service use. There’s an exciting future ahead on both sides of the Channel.

MEMBER PROFILE

A time of immense change Airwave national police user assurance co-ordinator Superintendent Lynne McCartney talks about her hopes for the imminent changeover from narrowband to broadband

Could you give me some information about your professional background in the police service? How did you first become involved with the digital communications aspect of policing? I joined Strathclyde Police as a PC in October 1989, so have almost 29 years’ police service. I’ve worked mainly in uniform roles for most of my time as an officer, having specialised during training as a constable, sergeant and inspector. I’ve also spent a couple of years in the intelligence environment, between 2003 and 2005, which was really interesting. I first became involved in the communications aspect of policing when I was promoted to chief inspector in 2011, with responsibility for the Area Control Room in Glasgow initially. Following the formation of Police Scotland in 2013 I took on national responsibility for the Airwave service. I took up post in my current role, national Airwave user assurance co-ordinator, in October 2014. In the last year or so my role has also become focused on the Emergency Services Network, and I am also a member of the National Police ESN Executive.

as the Royal Wedding and the visit of the US president. This will be to show what can be achieved with good planning, and also how the tactical advisor plays a key role during scenarios such as those. What benefits does the organisation offer? How have you benefited from it specifically? The organisation offers great benefits in terms of getting like-minded people together to help drive forward how the use of technology can assist with operational policing. For me personally, it provides access to numerous contacts and specialists who can help and advise me in my current role. It also provides a platform to showcase the needs of the emergency services, particularly in terms of technology as an enabler.

Q A

What will be the unique challenges faced by the sector going forward? What are the challenges and opportunities presented by new, broadband-enabled technology? The adoption of ESN and the switching off of the Airwave network will be a very big challenge for the sector in the next couple of years. This is a huge programme which will ultimately have great benefits for user organisations, but we need to ensure their safety in the transition period. Good planning will be key to this. The new technology will present us with many opportunities for improving our business processes and making us more efficient as a service. This will benefit both the public and officers greatly, which can only be a good thing.

How did you first come into contact with BAPCO as an organisation? What’s been the level of your involvement up until now, and what work do you carry out at the moment? I first came into contact with BAPCO around 2011, when I took up post in the area control room in Glasgow. I’ve been lucky enough to attend many BAPCO events since then, and it has been nice to see the organisation grow. I am currently a member of the “The adoption of ESN BAPCO executive committee and much of and the switching off my input has been around professionalising of Airwave will be a the role of the Airwave tactical advisor, and pushing as much information out there as I’m very big challenge able to. for the sector in the My team will be doing a presentation at next couple of years” the March conference based on the large events that have taken place this year, such

What advice would you give to users working in public safety comms during this time of change? I think it’s important for us to continue to stay positive during this period of transition. Colleagues need to be involved in the change process as much as they possibly can, and try to positively influence it if they can. It’s not going to be easy, but it will be worth it!

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Twitter: @BritishAPCO | www.bapco.org.uk | October 2018

FUTURE TECHNOLOGY

Out in the street The BAPCO Journal talks to the CEO of Coeus Software about his company’s workforce mobility platform, PoliceBox

he UK police service is currently transitioning its business processes away from the use of paper towards a primarily digital environment. Integral to this are officers on the beat, who are now using their phones to fill out documentation (for instance, details of a stop and search) which previously would have needed to be done back at the station, thereby taking a large chunk of time out of the day. This is something we have covered in a certain amount of depth in the BAPCO Journal, for instance in an article last year discussing the provision of smart devices in Greater Manchester, and the efficiencies that have subsequently been gained (see volume 23, issue 1). Then, of course, there is Motorola Solutions’ Pronto product, which has been integral to numerous services keeping their officers ‘away from the station’. This receives more than a passing mention in this month’s multiagency feature, starting on page 20. When it comes to workforce mobility platforms, however, there are a number of solutions providing variations on what has been a, quite frankly, game-changing model. One of these is Coeus Software’s PoliceBox app, which is the subject of this issue’s future tech feature.

PoliceBox enables a variety of communications functions

Fast-forward several years, and after a couple of further false starts, the company was finally ready to roll out the product in its current form. This involved, according to Hall, the building of a “modular and scalable” Microsoft Azure-based platform, capable of supporting millions of users at the same time. More to the point, however, it also involved the removal of any kind of bespoke architecture or functionality, meaning that the core of the solution would be fundamentally the same no matter which force was using it. This in turn made it quick and easy to deploy, while at the same time offering the opportunity for different organisations to share information with each other across what is essentially a uniform back end.

Phone the size of a brick

According to its description on the UK government’s Digital Marketplace website, PoliceBox is a “police mobility platform”, the use of which is accessible to officers via a variety of options, including smart devices and PCs. It allows users to “securely search or capture forms, tasks, tickets, statements, searches and more”, while at the same time linking into individual organisations’ back-office systems, using what is rather enigmatically referred to as “connectors”. Speaking of the origin of the solution, Coeus CEO Simon Hall says: “The product was born around 2007 in the form of something called Form Patrol, which essentially allowed officers to fill in paperwork while away from the station. We trialled it initially with the Home Office Police Standards Unit, followed by a period of work carried out with Lancashire Police. It was initially designed purely for the police.” He continues: “We weren’t able to fully develop the product, purely because of the limitations of the handsets at the time. We knew that mass-marketed smartphones were on the horizon and that they were going to be great for this type of work, but the technology just didn’t have enough oomph to fully take advantage of the idea. “The 2007 version was on Windows Mobile, which obviously doesn’t exist any more. The phones it would have worked on were essentially the size of a brick, which again wouldn’t have been ideal.”

Anything to report?

“We’ve essentially come up with a way to allow forces to configure their own processes”

According to Hall, the name of the product is a reference, somewhat unsurprisingly, to the first ‘police box’, which initially found its way onto British streets in the 1920s. The job of both devices, he says, is to keep officers in the community, with the original deployed in response to complaints that they were spending too much time at the station due to briefings, rota changes and the like. There is another way in which the two police boxes tie in with each other, in that – again, fairly obviously – they both facilitate

October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

FUTURE TECHNOLOGY

communication between officers and the station. Regarding the early 20th century iteration, this meant providing a convenient method of phoning in, for instance to request support, or to report anything unusual taking place. PoliceBox 2018, meanwhile, enables a variety of customisable communications functions, such as task and activity management, reporting, as well as intelligence-gathering. Going into greater detail about the product, and in particular crucial areas of its functionality, Hall says: “We’ve essentially come up with a way to allow forces to configure their own processes, through the use of a simple drag-and-drop interface. Nothing is bespoke in relation to the process of rolling it out. “It’s designed to enable officers to do anything they need to, from filling in simple forms to deployment via the force’s command and control system. We don’t make command and control units ourselves, but we are able to plug into them.” The other benefit of the system, according to Hall, is that once the processes are in place and proven to work, it allows those using the system to share what they have done with colleagues around the country. This again is an interesting feature, which also chimes with British policing’s other

current drive to encourage organisations to work together and communicate across force boundaries. Speaking of this, Hall says: “We’re trying to be as open as possible, so that if one customer has designed a process which has been useful to them, they can send it along to another force. That way the Service can really start making some moves, taking advantage of the technology which is now available to it while on the beat.” He continues: “One of the problems we believe exists at the moment is that forces have only managed to digitise something like 40 processes in the space of 10 years. In reality, the police have hundreds of processes, many more of which could be completed using their smart devices. One of the major milestones – which we’ve been able to take advantage of – was last year, when Microsoft got the green light to store police data on Azure.” Hall says forces currently using Police Box include Avon and Somerset, Sussex and Dorset, with Surrey just about to come on-board. As befits the ‘plug-and-play’ nature of the product, it is procured on a user-per-month basis, something which Hall believes affords the opportunity for forces to see “an instantaneous return on their investment”. The UK emergency services are currently undergoing a series of massive shifts in how they carry out their business, the likes of which, it would be fair to say, haven’t been seen for generations. Much of this change is down to advances in digital communications technology, which is providing both increased situational awareness and much-needed ‘efficiencies’ at a time when funding is at a premium. Solutions such as Police Box (as well as its non-police sister app, Quvo) are integral to this journey into a fully digitised future.

Twitter: @BritishAPCO | www.bapco.org.uk | October 2018

WHAT IF

Run, hide, tweet Dr Dave Sloggett discusses the ways in which social media can be effectively utilised by the emergency services in the event of a large-scale terrorist atrocity

The scenario

The current, almost blanket, use of social media across seemingly all sections of society is coming in for increasing criticism. For instance, photo-sharing apps such as Instagram and Snapchat have recently been linked to a decline in the mental health of young people, as per a Royal Society for Public Health study carried out last year. This – according to the society’s chief executive Shirley Cramer (as quoted by the BBC) – is likely due to their being “very image-focused”, and operating in a way which “appears they may be driving feelings of inadequacy and anxiety”. Another area where social media has been criticised, meanwhile, is in its potential to inhibit the emergency services in the course of their duties. How many police officers are filmed while struggling to contain civil disorder, for instance, something that is difficult enough without also having to take account of oversight by YouTube? But while social networking can certainly be seen as a medium that can pose a problem for those trying to enforce the law, it also has the potential to be enormously useful. This is something that has been covered in the pages of the BAPCO Journal, with inspector Kerry Blakeman giving an account of his efforts to engage with the local community through the use of Twitter, Facebook Live and so on (see volume 23, issue 4). At the same time, it also has huge potential when it comes to the policing of serious, large-scale incidents such as flooding, pandemics, major fires and so on. That being the case, what if the police and their colleagues in the emergency services could harness social media’s power in the wake of an incident such as last year’s terror attack at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester? Could, for example, the apparent hesitancy in response to the incident by the fire and rescue service in particular have been avoided through the better use of social-media-derived intelligence?

Paris has been the site of several devastating terrorist attacks

The solution

Terror attacks, by their nature, involve many moments – particularly at the start – that are highly chaotic. Imagine an attack on an airport terminal, of which there have been many in recent years (in Russia, Belgium, Pakistan, Turkey and the United States, to name a few), each with its own nuances. At the beginning of these events, bystanders tend to scatter as quickly as possible when they realise their lives are in danger. This is of course perfectly natural, but unfortunately only ticks two out of three boxes in the ‘run, hide and tell’ narrative pushed out by the UK police to help inform the public what to do in situations like this.

“Social media can become a core channel of communication between the public, emergency responders and government”

For me, the biggest issue in relation to this kind of helpful communication (or the potential lack of it) on the part of the public is that in the first instance they don’t know what exactly to ‘tell’. They also don’t really know to whom to tell it. The police have not really been specific about their ideas in relation to this area. With that in mind, imagine a terrorist attack on a major airport terminal in the UK. Within seconds, people will be posting about their lives being in danger, the first few examples of which are likely to be rich in profanities. They are also likely to be repetitive, as tends to be the case with communication when people are under extreme stress. While this should not be considered particularly ‘information rich’ in some senses, if nothing else it can at least confirm the initial extent of the attack from a geographical point of view. It can also help eliminate questions as to whether other areas are being targeted in parallel, as was the case in Paris in November 2015, with numerous attacks being mounted around the city with the possible intention of distracting the firearms response. Conversely, if several targets are being

October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

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WHAT IF

attacked at the same time, social media posts can potentially provide positive confirmation that the kind of multi-nodal/complex incident referred to above is under way. This could be hugely informative when developing resource deployment alternatives. Going back to the scenario of people scattering due to an attack on an airport, the likelihood is that they will go in the opposite direction from where they perceive the threat to originate. Some may choose to hide, while others may even play dead (a tactic that sadly didn’t work during the aforementioned Paris attacks, where terrorists actually reswept the Bataclan theatre to kill anyone hiding among the bodies). As mentioned, those who still remain active may choose to tweet what’s happening. While this on the whole has only been helpful to the authorities in a very broad sense, there have been instances where more overtly valuable information was forthcoming. One of these was the Nairobi Westgate Shopping Mall attack in 2013, where Twitter actually became a core channel of communication between the government, emergency responders and the public. This occurred, quite simply, through civilians and

first-responders interacting with each other directly, facilitating situational awareness on one side, and reassurance on the other. With that in mind, the latent (or not so latent) power of social media is also demonstrated by how the Al-Shabaab terrorists themselves used it during the same incident. Showing both extraordinary sophistication and awareness of the power of propaganda to terrify, the organisation gloatingly live-tweeted the attacks in English, Somali, Arabic and Swahili. The UK government are – if all goes to plan – on the verge of replacing the current narrowband public safety communications system (Airwave) with the broadband Emergency Services Network (ESN). As well as mission-critical push-to-talk, this will also deliver enhanced data services, something which clearly offers a myriad of new opportunities when it comes to the use of social media platforms to help shape dynamic risk assessment. Returning to last year’s terrorist atrocity in Manchester, imagine if the firefighters en route to the incident had access not only to ESN but also the ability to systematically analyse tweets sent out by members of the public. Now imagine that the public themselves were fully informed as to the best way to aid the emergency services in terms of providing them with situational intelligence via the use of social media. As well as informing operational strategy, another benefit of the smarter use of social platforms (including sites such as What’sApp) would be the ability for those in and around the scene to communicate with each other. Again, one relatively straightforward way of doing this in Manchester would have been for first-responders to set up a messaging group at strategic or tactical level to share what they were hearing or seeing at any given moment, almost as a kind of back channel. This would, in the first instance, have the massive advantage of dispelling any potential rumours about the situation, information which could then be passed onto the public – via the likes of Twitter – once verified. It would also have the extra advantage of keeping non-essential radio use to a minimum. Such a use of contemporary communications systems is a natural progression of practices that have already started to appear (albeit in a somewhat ad hoc fashion). The highest-profile example of this is probably the use of Twitter by emergency services colleagues in London, who are increasingly willing to repost material from the now ubiquitous ‘citizen journalist’. This ‘crowdsourcing’ of information obviously requires some discernment, ideally in the form of intelligence-based analytical software to filter the information that has operational value. That accomplished, however, social media clearly has the potential to be an incredibly powerful tool.

Twitter: @BritishAPCO | www.bapco.org.uk | October 2018

ESS REPORT

On with the show The BAPCO Journal reports on the highlights from this year’s Emergency Services Show, which took place at the Birmingham NEC in September Day one The first presentation of the ESS Technology Theatre was delivered by the Cabinet Office’s Nigel Brown, who – in his discussion of ‘Joining up technology across the services’ – set the tone for the show’s digital communications content across the two days. Brown used his half an hour to give an overview of the current digital communications landscape, and by extension the challenges and opportunities presented by it to the UK emergency services. Elaborating on this, he said that – while clearly hugely beneficial – the increasing convergence of communications and content (for instance, across smart devices, telephony and so on) is also giving public safety organisations a certain amount of confusion in terms of what they should be developing and rolling out. The trick in relation to this, he said, was in the increasingly difficult task of working out “what’s driving what”, while at the same time being able to sort the genuinely game-changing technology from that which has simply been massively hyped. He mentioned the Internet of Things and artificial intelligence in the former category, while being less convinced about 5G which, he suggested, somewhat controversially, would ultimately be just a quicker version of what we currently have. Offering advice, he suggested that organisations “stay nimble” through measures such as the use of cloud computing, while also “avoiding supplier lock-in at all costs”. He finished by saying, not inaccurately, that “society is becoming hyper-connected and more conscious of cost”. Bearing Brown’s words in mind, the next part of the day focused on technology that seems to be having a profoundly positive effect on UK public safety, in the shape of drones. This presentation came from West Midlands Police, whose burgeoning UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) project – according to the West Mids’ officer in charge – has revolutionised the policing of public spaces. He illustrated this by discussing a variety of examples, such as urban areas where knife crime has drastically reduced following the introduction of an aerial presence. He also showed footage of a group of suspects riding stolen off-road motorcycles, subsequently being dispersed by a drone hovering overhead. Other presentations on the first day included Mid and West Wales’ Steve McLinden discussing the force’s attempt to digitise its business processes, as well as Gwent Police’s Stewart Poulton on its mobile command unit. An international flavour was provided by Fire and Rescue New South Wales, which discussed ‘Traditional and contemporary IT thinking’.

Day two

The second day began with more presentations continuing the

theme of convergence, starting with West Midlands Fire Service discussing its software development effort, specifically workflow management. Technical director of Excelerate Group Simon Hill, meanwhile, talked about his company’s work creating secure, multi-platform communications links for emergency services vehicles, as illustrated by a recent collaboration on Northamptonshire FRS’s new mobile command unit. The Technology Theatre Programme was finished off by a discussion conducted by Mott MacDonald’s Helen Shapcott and Sarah Vant, giving attendees an overview of multi-agency incident transfer (otherwise known as MAIT). They began their presentation by outlining the MAIT standard, ie, “to allow incident records to be electronically shared between agencies [by using a defined field structure and values]”. This was followed by a survey of the benefits of implementing the system, such as improved response times to incidents attended by secondary agencies. Shapcott and Vant finished with an update on the ‘the London Project’, which is being carried out by the capital’s ambulance and fire services in order to support co-responding. According to the presenters, the two agencies are currently working together to define how the data fields will be used, and the hub service procurement is also under way. “MAIT has huge potential to revolutionise the way people work,” said Vant. “But we [organisations] first need to try it out.”

October 2018 | www.bapco.org.uk | Twitter: @BritishAPCO

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BAPCO chief executive Ian Thompson discusses a potential new method for marketing the Emergency Services Network

Why should you become a member? British APCO provides an active information exchange between all those engaged in the use and provision of public safety control rooms and communications. British APCO membership provides you with: A sector magazine – the British APCO Journal – four times per year. Free entry at all of our annual and regional information exchange and conferencing events. Regular newsletter updates on recent developments surrounding the association and the public safety world. Sign-in to the ‘Members’ area of the BAPCO website.This will give access to presentations and full details of our project work and other relevant information. A unique opportunity to network with other professionals engaged in this critically important facet of the work of the public safety and resilience services.

fter months of waiting – and no little discussion and rumour – the Home Office has finally confirmed the new approach to the roll out of the Emergency Services Network and ESMCP [see page 8 for more details]. As the most important emergency services development in many years, this announcement is most welcome. It puts an element of control into the hands of users, while at the same time clarifying the situation for industry partners. BAPCO strongly supports the ESMCP as a concept but has never been afraid to question elements of it, such as timescale “BAPCO strongly and implementation strategy. With that in mind, supports ESMCP over recent months we have seen more engagement as a concept, and a greater amount of information in the public but has never domain, for which the Home Office team and their been afraid to colleagues are to be commended. On a related subject, your president, John question elements Anthony, and I attended the APCO International of it, such as Conference & Exhibition in Las Vegas in August. implementation Whilst the scale of the event was different from strategy” ours, the issues discussed in the sessions were almost the same. The influence of their FirstNet project is huge and represents a fundamentally different approach to promotion and publicity compared to the Home Office model. Everywhere we went at the conference – and in Vegas itself – there was no doubt that ‘FirstNet: Powered by AT&T’ is the future. This is of course excellent marketing, but there is also no denying the confidence it builds in the concept. They are aiming at potential users, but also raising awareness with businesses and the public at the same time. It is a strategy which could pay off over here. Going back to ESN, as ever there are more questions than answers. With that in mind, our next event is in Newcastle on the 7th and 8th of November, and we have confirmed sessions from the Home Office team to talk about the direction of the programme. Airwave will also be there to tell us how they plan to not just continue the service, but improve it. I look forward to seeing you in Newcastle.

Ian Thompson Chief executive, BAPCO 34

Twitter: @BritishAPCO | www.bapco.org.uk | October 2018

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