Policing and home affairs

The suppliers, products and customers in this chapter are in the landscape database, filtered to policing and home affairs, with known spend and sources. The graph shows how they connect.

Sector overview

UK policing is delivered by 43 territorial forces in England and Wales, plus Police Scotland, the PSNI, British Transport Police, and the National Crime Agency. National policing capabilities are managed centrally by the National Police Chiefs’ Council, the College of Policing, and a set of national programmes (PNC, NLEDS, ANPR). Home affairs covers immigration, borders, and visa systems run by the Home Office.

The estate splits into three layers: national policing systems (PNC, ANPR, NLEDS, Athena), force-level operational systems (record management, command-and-control, dispatch), and specialist tooling (body-worn video, digital forensics, ANPR). All of it is subject to information-management standards (MOPI), retention rules, and growing digital-evidence obligations under the Disclosure regime.

Major systems

Lock-in and concentration

Force-level RMS is concentrated on three products: Niche RMS, Athena (NEC), and Connect (NEC). Body-worn video and digital evidence are heavily concentrated on Axon, a US-incorporated supplier whose evidence-management cloud (Evidence.com) hosts a large and growing volume of UK policing material. Command-and-control is split across a handful of suppliers but each force’s deployment is deeply integrated into operational dispatch.

The largest sovereignty concern in policing is the Axon estate. Body-worn video footage and digital case files of UK policing investigations sit in a US-vendor cloud under terms that have prompted public concern multiple times. The US CLOUD Act creates a legal exposure whose extent is disputed. Replacement is operationally feasible but difficult politically and in procurement terms once the service is in use at scale.

NLEDS (the long-running PNC/PND replacement programme) is in its second decade and has been the subject of multiple reset reviews. It is publicly owned, but delivery has relied heavily on systems integrators.

Replaceability

Force RMS: Niche, Athena, Connect B

RMS is functionally a domain-specific case-management system with strong audit, MOPI compliance, and integration with national systems (PNC/NLEDS). Open alternatives do not exist as turnkey products. A build is plausible but would take several years and needs a lead force willing to be the first user. It is a Tier-2 candidate and beyond the CIC’s scale on its own.

Body-worn video and DEMS B

The technical components are not novel: video capture, encrypted storage, retention rules, audit, redaction tooling, and disclosure packaging. Open alternatives do not exist as integrated products but each component has open analogues. Given the sovereignty concerns, a publicly owned UK DEMS is a Tier-1 candidate at sector level. It is well beyond the CIC’s scale; the CIC could argue for it.

Command-and-control / 999 dispatch C

Safety-critical real-time systems with Civil Contingencies obligations and integration to ESN. Replacement is not realistic in the foreseeable future, and these systems could arguably be graded D, like some defence systems.

National policing systems D

PNC, NLEDS, ANPR are publicly owned. Sovereignty work here concerns governance, openness and reducing SI dependency.

Visa and immigration C

These systems are operationally critical, closely integrated with biometrics and external service providers, and politically sensitive. Only internal modernisation is realistic.

The human dimension

Frontline policing reports of digital tools focus on three issues: too many systems, too much double-keying, and digital-evidence workflow that adds hours per case to disclosure preparation. The HMICFRS PEEL inspection programme regularly flags these in its inspection reports. Body-worn video and DEMS in particular have improved evidence quality while substantially increasing administrative burden.

Adaptation sovereignty is low at force level. Forces with strong internal digital teams (Met, GMP, West Midlands) have more leverage over vendors than smaller forces, but vendor roadmaps still drive product evolution.

Hands-off

Sector summary