Stuart Ayres MP, Member for Penrith joined Senior Sergeant Viv Motbey and Senior Constable Chris Guinery to announce the roll out of additional mobile tablet devices for frontline officers in Penrith, which will simplify the process of issuing infringements and allowing officers mobile access to police systems.
Already 900 devices from the Mobile Policing Program have been delivered to Local Area Commands across NSW as part of the NSW Government’s ‘Policing for Tomorrow’ fund and now another 1300 will be rolled out statewide.
In 2016-17, $36 million was allocated towards programs like this one as part of a $100 million commitment over four years.
Local Area Commands in metropolitan Sydney will receive 500 devices, while 800 tablets will be delivered to regional areas in northern, southern and western NSW.
“These devices simplify the process of issuing infringements so officers don’t have to return to the station meaning they spend more time out on the beat,” Stuart Ayres said.
“It will be of particular benefit to officers in country areas who travel long distances to return to their station to complete administrative tasks.
“The rollout of these devices will mean increased flexibility and less paperwork for frontline police.”
Officers will be able to issue infringements electronically via email or mobile text message rather than having to return to their station.
In addition the NSW Police database is being overhauled with funding allocated to modernise the computerised operational policing system (COPS).
COPS is vital to the day to day operations of the force including logging criminal incidents, gathering intelligence and issuing infringements. The system is more than 20 years old and until 2011 was a text-only data entry and retrieval system. It is now moving to a web-based interface ‘WebCOPS’ which will improve usability.
“The new mobile devices being rolled out will be able to access webCOPS which will allow for more efficiency and synchronicity,” Stuart Ayres said.
“Officers in the field will have access to more operationally relevant information and it will eliminate the duplication of data entry.”
