Outsourcing to be Considered to Protect Frontline Policing

Posted on June 1, 2012

Outsourcing of police support services in Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire is being considered as part of continuing efforts to tackle the £73 million shortfall in police funding for the three counties.

Police Authority members in the three counties will be asked to consider later this month (June) how services including HR, finance and ICT could be outsourced in future as part of a joint recommendation made by the three chief constables.

The move comes as part of the on-going collaboration between Bedfordshire Police, Cambridgeshire Constabulary and Hertfordshire Constabulary. 

A recommendation that a full business case should be developed to scrutinise this proposal in more detail was discussed on Wednesday (May 30) by the Police Authorities Joint Collaboration Working Group.

As a result, it was agreed that each of the three Police Authorities will be asked in late June to consider formally the commissioning of a Full Business Case for outsourcing support services through the existing Lincolnshire Police framework, with G4S as the supplier.

If agreed by all three police authorities, the earliest that outsourced services could be in place would be April 2013.