Agenda item

To inform the executive committee of the progress of the Hertfordshire CCTV Partnership during 2017/8 and to consider the annual Management & Independent Inspector’s reports as part of the Annual Operations Report.

RESOLVED:  That the CCTV Joint Executive “Exchange to Note” the 2017/18 Annual Operations Report.

REASON FOR DECISION: In order that the Annual Operations Report provides an overview of Hertfordshire CCTV performance over a 12 month period and provides the necessary quality assurance around the operation of a CCTV Network.

Audio recording 6.13

The Committee considered the Annual report presented by Mr Gregory who explained that the 2017/18 Operations Report had included an independent Inspector’s Report, which had confirmed a “good bill of health” in terms of the CCTV network, that had met all requirements.

Questions were raised by Members following this report, for which some were answered.  The CCTV Partnership Joint Executive would be provided with further detail to any queries remaining unanswered:-

1. What is ADPRO?

Answer provided:  It is an operating system associated with the CCTV system, more detail on this will be provided at the next Committee Meeting.

2. When considering the number of incidents, a large proportion were initiated by either the Police or Airwaves. Therefore, was the control room proactive or reactive and what role did ADPRO play in this?

3. Was the increase in the number of cameras being deployed within the Partnership, and other statistics included in the report, due to new contracts to the company, or purely an increase for the Partnership?

4. In respect of re-deployable cameras, please provide more information about Rapid Vision, such as who they are, what they do and why this has changed?

5. Concern was expressed regarding the number of activations at schools and that 250,000 activations with 39 incidents raised questions about what was happening, and was this cost effective?

6. Concern was expressed that the pleasing lower number of incidents did not appear to tally with the information being provided by the Police. Therefore, did this mean the system was effective in preventing incidents or had something else changed?

Answer provided:  Will ask for analysis to be undertaken to explain the trend.

7. With investment in high definition cameras, courts now had the capability to view in other high definition formats, so providing evidence on DVD only did not take advantage of those capabilities.  Did we only supply evidence in DVD format, or in other formats in order to take advantage of high definition?

Answer provided:  Currently only provided on DVD.  Other opportunities regarding how data might be transferred and shared had been explored.

8. Would the new technology mentioned in question 7 be installed and utilised in the new control centre?

Answer provided:  We would not wish to install equipment in the new control centre that was not in line with the ambitions of the Partnership regarding sharing information, but we need to make sure this was something that could be done, but assurance of viability would be paramount.

9. In respect of Control Room Performance and the statement that, “this service has been used by solicitors in private complaints.”  Was RIPA Policy being referred to and adhered to?

Answer provided:  Yes, those kinds of viewing requests have to go through a particular approval protocol and third-party viewing went through these protocols.

10. Concern was expressed that the reason for the low number in the infrequency of the officer’s attendance, which has on occasion resulted in footage requests falling outside of the 28 day storage limit. This was not an inexpensive operation, that seemed to be driven by the Police.  Were statistics on the number of occasions where non-attendance by the Police resulted in footage falling outside of the time limit in order to provide evidence to Police of the effect of non-attendance?

Answer provided:  These frustrations have been shared with the local Police Forces. The reasons given for non-attendance included that officers were not being available, due to being redeployed. The download suite had been provided for this purpose and it was frustrating when, despite repeated reminders, Offices did not attend to view the evidence and therefore the suite was not being fully utilised.  This was something that, with the guidance of the Executive, further action could be discussed with the Police.

11. Had training been put in place to enable the Inspectors to be able to keep up with the modern technology, and were there plans in place to provide the equipment and space required for the Inspectors?

Answer provided:  Discussions were taking place about not only about refresher training for Inspectors, but also how to recruit new Inspectors across the Districts as there was a need to increase the number of Inspectors coming into the control room. There was an opportunity, particularly with a new control room, for all of this to be built in as part of the induction programme for new Inspectors, particularly taking on board the need for new equipment to be available.

In view of the large amount of queries and responses raised it was

RESOLVED:  That the CCTV Joint Executive “Exchange to Note” the 2017/18 Annual Operations Report.

REASON FOR DECISION: In order that the Annual Operations Report provides an overview of Hertfordshire CCTV performance over a 12 month period and provides the necessary quality assurance around the operation of a CCTV Network.