CityForum Interoperability Round Table
4 February 2010, London
The importance of improving communications
interoperability in the context of resilience and the ‘Prepare’
strand of UK’s Counter Terrorism Strategy, CONTEST, is of great
interest to senior officers and executives in the Emergency
Services. Implementation of capabilities that bring together the
necessary people, processes and technologies is attracting
significant attention from a broad stakeholder group across all the
Category 1 and 2 Responding Agencies, as well as from politicians,
academics, and suppliers.
CityForum, together with the National
Police Improvement Agency (NPIA), held a round table to promote the
current programme of work to integrate voice with data sharing
capabilities across the emergency services, and to agree the scope
and roadmap for implementation of the capabilities needed to
achieve multi-agency communications interoperability.
VEGA sponsored the event and provided
an industry perspective on the interoperability debate. Steve
Coles, author of VEGA White Paper: "Do we
need to Share to Prepare?" and industry representative to RISC
contributed to the panel discussion on how interoperability can be
achieved, sharing his views on how a national
information sharing strategy would help drive the cultural
change to ensure interoperability is achieved. He also raised the
topic of how the 'Facebook' can evolve attitudes to information sharing.
VEGA has a long-established heritage
supporting UK defence and security organisations design, develop
and integrate complex communication and information systems that
deliver information superiority and enhance frontline
capability.
For more information about VEGA’s work
on secure communication and information systems, please visit the
In Focus section of our website. Further
details are also available on the CityForum website.