In an interview with The Register, newly-instated Head of the Police ICT Company Martin Wyke has indicated how the UK’s police might go about reducing its hefty £1 billion-a-year IT bill.

The Police ICT Company was established in June 2015 after a four-year gestation period; Wyke has previously worked as CIO for the likes of TalkTalk, Virgin Media and Debenhams, and is expected to apply his expertise first and foremost to saving money for police departments across Great Britain.

The organisation’s official aim is to cut at least £150 million a year from the police’s spending on IT-related services, with Wyke claiming that he can reduce IT spend by 10 per cent by 2020, shaving £100 million of the police’s current IT expenses.

He expects to do this primarily by transforming procurement procedures, consolidating licensing contracts and cutting down on the number of data centres currently used. However, the most substantial savings are likely to come from people: Wyke believes that there are a high number of role duplications across the UK’s 43 police forces, which will also be consolidated over the next five years.

On the subject of outsourcing, Wyke stated that it would certainly have “a role to play” in the future of police IT, but refrained from elaborating: “There are certain functions that I would be happy to see outsourced, and others that would be better to keep in-house," he said.

Wyke also declined to comment on the Met’s recent decision to outsource a variety of back office services to Shared Services Collected Limited, in a contract valued at £216 million.

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