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Dunfries and Galoway Police gain operational benefits
Following on from last month, Dawn Read continues her report into
the operational benefits Dumfries and Galloway Police is benefitting
from since going live with Airwave...
Dumfries and Galloway Police Force work closely with the MoD Police,
Atomic Energy Authority and British Transport Police (BTP),since going live on Airwave it will now be possible for the force to interoperate with each agency on the same radio scheme and sharing talk groups if necessary in the event of a major incident situation.
Commenting John Hughes, communications manager says,“Whilst the MoD has only recently gone live on the service, there are agreed protocols in place for us to use the same talk group in an emergency situation. This will certainly improve not only the efficiency of our force but that of the MoD also.”
In addition, the force has already seen benefits of interoperability with BTP when major league football matches are held within the area.
Hughes also points out that since the MTH800 handsets are APLS enabled, it brings further operational benefits to the force in terms of officer safety.
“Health and Safety issues are of paramount importance to the force, and with Lone worker protection regulations, the APLS gives rise to the emergency button being even more effective.” Furthermore, as highlighted by Alan Glendinning, supervisory officer for Annadale and Eskdale Subdivision,there are additional benefits that come with
the new radio scheme and that being of ambient listening. “Whilst there is concern the advantages outweigh this for police officers. For instance if a complaint, following an incident, is made against an officer, this can be readily and easily investigated.”
“The Ambient listening mode is only activated if a situation necessitates it, furthermore it is switched off once the situation is under control. All of our officers understand why it is used
(when it is used) and that it is predominantly for their safety.”
To ensure that the prime reason is identified as officer safety there are strict controls in the usage, yet already it has proven to be a major benefit when there was a threat on an officers life.
Glendinning continues,“Albeit we are a rural force, we do have the potential of incidents that necessitate full use of APLS and ambient listening, yet obviously we don’t have the proliferation of crime as in urban areas.”
Overall Hughes believes the system is already showing major operational benefits to the force.“The voice clarity, coverage and reliability of the network are proving their worth which in turn
is increasing our officer efficiency since they have the ability to place the call and actually speak first time round!”
“In addition the number of journeys back to the station have been
significantly reduced again helping improve efficiency of the force.”
Whilst mobile data has yet to be implemented, Hughes agrees that it is a possible aspect of the future and the force will be exploring the benefits of PDAs to further help keep officers out in the community.
