'Allo, 'allo, 'allo - police control room contract goes to NTL

£25m, seven-year, voice-over-IP deal

NTL has won a £25m seven-year contract to supply, install and maintain a communications platform for London's Metropolitan Police Authority. NTL's Public Safety group will act as a system integrator, connecting 31 police control rooms across Greater London using a voice-over-IP network. The integrated platform will serve over 540 positions, giving agents access to the new Airwave digital mobile radio service, analogue radio systems, telephony, 3,500 CCTV cameras and other communications systems via a touch screen GUI. There have been complaints in the past about the IT that underpins critical emergency service operations - and more recently complaints from officers using Airwave handsets - but Paul Glaister, telecoms programme director at the Metropolitan Police Service, said in a statement that the new set-up will provide the Met with "a truly state-of-the-art integrated control room system bringing together many different communications systems within a single desktop terminal in an efficient and user-friendly way". There will be three main equipment hubs, at the Met's C3i centres at Hendon, Lambeth and Bow, while NTL support will be delivered from the company's Nine Elms support centre on London's South Bank.