Information & Communications Technology (ICT) Plan 2018-2021 · 2019-10-28 · Information & Communications Technology Plan 2018-21 Page 2 of 9 ICT Themes 2018/2021 The ICT Plan identifies

Information & Communications

Technology (ICT) Plan

2018-2021

Humberside Fire and Rescue Service Information & Communications Technology Plan 2018-21

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Introduction

Purpose This plan outlines how we will use ICT to support the work of keeping the communities in the Humber area safe, keeping our firefighters safe, and contributing to the firefighting and rescue capabilities of the United Kingdom. Overall aim Our vision is that Information and Communications Technology (ICT) is a strategic asset, which delivers a gateway into a complete set of systems that support us to meet our Strategic Plan: ICT is a key component in supporting a modern and effective fire and rescue service. Funding to deliver this Plan is largely from the ICT Capital budget, which is set by the Fire Authority on a risk-based approach. Where appropriate, an ‘Invest to Save’ model will be adopted. ICT forms a key part of transforming how we work, and to prevent the loss of life, injuries, and impact on communities, caused by emergency incidents and inspires community confidence. It contributes towards the overarching change agenda. The aim is for user-centric, data driven, and intelligence led operating model, with ICT able to support our people and communities, when and where that support is needed. This will be delivered through ICT that is agile, resilient, and effective. Delivery of this plan will be through a set of inter-related projects over the next 3 years. Inevitably the delivery plan will develop and change over time, but this ICT Plan sets the direction for the next 3 years. This Plan is an enabler to the Service’s Principles and Behaviours of Leadership, Passion, Dependability and Innovation for how we work in the future.


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ICT Themes 2018/2021 The ICT Plan identifies the following 6 themes that will help us deliver our Strategic Plan. Each theme sets out a summary of that area and identifies the key areas of focus, which become key priorities and actions in the ICT Delivery Plan.

1. Agile Working: providing access to ICT facilities for our people wherever they are, whenever they need it.

2. People and Skills: ensuring our people are well supported, trained and equipped to fulfil their role.

3. Information Resources: providing our people with the right information, at the right time, to make our communities safer, and respond effectively to emergency incidents.

4. Development and Maintenance of Infrastructure: ensuring the core architecture supports the technology and systems needed to deliver ICT Services.

5. Collaborative Working: providing integrated tools to enable communication and collaboration between our people and others with whom they work.

6. Security and Governance: ensuring our systems and processes are secure and follow recognised practices.


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Theme 1 - Agile Working: providing access to ICT facilities for our people wherever they are, whenever they need it. The core commitment of this theme is to ensure that our people can work at the heart of the communities, with access to the full range of information to support our outcomes. This means that they have equipment, systems, and technology that enable access to the details they need, to perform their role effectively on an ‘any time, any place’ basis. Changes to working practices that are enabled through ICT will generate more capacity to support our work. Hosted, internet and cloud based applications will typically provide access to information and systems that are hardware and operating system independent, and supports a more focused ‘right tool for the job’ principle. This drive for joined-up electronic working will reduce the need for manual and isolated paper based systems, and provide the potential for automation which means that partners, and our people, can be made aware of changes to the risk profile more quickly, and in a joined-up way, that has been difficult to create previously. On-line collaboration tools will enable our people to stay in touch to ensure consistent messages are delivered, and trigger support from other parts of the Service when necessary. Connectivity to high-speed networks will be a key enabler to this and where this is not available through 4G/LTE technology, arrangements will be developed with partners to provide Wi-Fi access through their infrastructure on a reciprocal basis.

“Allow our people to work on ‘an

anytime, anyplace’ basis.”

Key Areas of Focus: Refresh of ICT systems, equipment and connectivity to support ‘anytime, anyplace’

working.

Providing access to systems where connectivity is easy, and location-independent. Implementing Office 365 services for Exchange, SharePoint, and OneDrive,

followed by Teams, Planner, Flow, etc. Delivering ICT Services that are highly available, reducing the time required for

maintenance and upgrades whenever possible. Reducing manual and paper-based processes, and developing solutions that use

digitised and automated workflows.

Develop an ‘Invest to Save’ model that focuses on remodelling working practices and processes to reduce inefficiency and maximise impact on the communities we serve.


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Theme 2 - People and Skills: ensuring our people are well supported, trained and equipped to fulfil their role. The people and skills theme recognises ICT can help grow a diverse workforce, by breaking down some of the barriers to traditional working arrangements, by offering flexibility and recognising that “work is something you do, not a place you go”. ICT can only truly deliver the full range of benefits when our people are:

Properly trained on how to get the most from technology and systems;

Allowed to innovate and drive forward changes which improve support to communities, reduces risk, and are efficient and effective;

Encouraged to buy into (and benefit from) the flexibility technology brings, and be involved in the discussions over updating of systems;

Supported by competent ICT Professionals. The intuitive nature of many applications and devices – particularly those ones that cross over between personal and professional use – mean that the general level of Technology Literacy is high. This means that there is a high yield of expertise for us to benefit from in the development of new refreshed applications.

“Those at the centre of ICT

provision will ensure that our

people are well supported,

trained and equipped to fulfil

their role.”

Key Areas of Focus: Providing suitable skills training for our people to ensure they have the underlying

competencies to get the most from the ICT facilities at their disposal.

Providing good quality support and training for the most commonly used ICT systems and software, including through the use of e-learning, train the trainer, and blended learning.

Supporting the Health and Safety Policy, in particularly ensuring that technology

contributed to a healthy and safe working environment.

Ensuring that ICT Professionals have appropriate training and development to keep pace with emerging technology and new ways of working.

Developing, rewarding, and recognising professional ICT staff, and the dependency

the Service has for them in supporting critical ICT facilities.

Reviewing working practices to ensure they remain fit for purpose in light of new technology, which includes employee related arrangements.


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Theme 3 - Information Resources: providing our people with the right information, at the right time, to make our communities safer and respond effectively, and efficiently to emergency incidents. The focus of this theme is on providing enough of the right information to the right place at the right time to:

Inspire community confidence and make our communities safer by creating a rich picture of risk, including details of business and domestic risk, taking into account relevant factors, and presenting these details through mapping and similar tools. This will support the decision making on targeted prevention activities, and preparing operational risk information to assist when attending emergency incidents;

Help communities support themselves by providing appropriate and relevant information, alongside the provision of resources relevant to their individual needs. Help keep them safe and have additional available channels of contact to request further assistance;

Prevent the loss of life, injuries, and impact on communities, by responding effectively, and efficiently, to emergency incidents by having accurate and up to date information about the area, its risks, and providing a fast and efficient flow of information between where an emergency incident is taking place, and to all of those who need to deal with it.

Accurate, dynamic, and up to date planning and demand prediction tools, will support decision making around resource deployment. This will be based on historical patterns and likely future need, taking into account ‘what-if’ scenarios through integrated data sets, including GIS/Mapping, social/demographic, and integrated road network information. This contributes towards the development of our Integrated Risk Management Plan (IRMP).

“Provide our people with timely,

accurate, and auditable

information that helps them make

sound decisions, at any location,

including at emergency incidents.”

Key Areas of Focus: Increased usage of video images to support our response to emergency incidents

by making images available to those managing the incident, Service Control, and other agencies through Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (Drones), Body worn cameras, CCTV, and other devices to enhance situational awareness.

Providing technology that keeps our people safe at emergency incidents through

body worn biometrics, telemetry, and personal positioning systems and providing a broader range of operational risk information, including from open-sources, and collaborative partnerships, and provide this to the incident ground through technology to support the resolution of emergency incidents.

Access to details about those who are the most vulnerable in our communities so

that they can be supported appropriately and kept safe. Enhanced tools to support risk based inspections for commercial premises and

increase efficiency by dealing with the whole process in a single visit.

Provide more information to communities through a refreshed website and other social media channels.


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Theme 4 - Development and Maintenance of Infrastructure: ensuring the core architecture supports the technology and systems needed to deliver ICT Services. This theme focuses on developing and maintaining the core ICT architecture to reflect the needs of a modern and forward looking emergency service. The need for investment continues, although the profile of expenditure has changed as hosted, internet and cloud based technology (sometimes called Software as a Service or SaaS) start to provide a realistic alternative which is highly available and resilient. In considering areas for review will have emphasis on:

Resilience and high availability of mission critical applications as a top priority and the core infrastructure supports this by incorporating fault tolerance and automatic failover mechanisms. More recently this has involved deploying virtual server technology, where a number of physical servers host multiple server instances, and management tools balance the resources needed automatically.

Evaluation of technology means that over time the profile and type of equipment required to deliver services change. Hosted, internet, and cloud based applications require a different type of infrastructure to traditional, on premise technology. The challenge is in maximising prior investment while not retiring equipment too soon.

Responsive network connectivity between our people and the applications they use will need to be in place. Closer working with Humberside Police to ensure we can offer resilience to each other as and when required.

“Looking for newer technology to allow the Service to operate

more efficiently, and effectively, and to maximise

the investment made with the current infrastructure.”

Key Areas of Focus: Reviewing the Wide Area Network (WAN), with a view to meet additional capacity

requirements, and consider the additional security requirements for the Public Services Network (PSN), Emergency Services Network (ESN) and Airwave Code of Connection.

Migrating systems to hosted, internet, and cloud based solutions, as they are refreshed and using systems which mean data is entered once and reused wherever possible.

Incrementally transition to the Emergency Services Network (ESN), to support emergency incident response and non-emergency functions, as the products become available.

Contributing towards to the technology refresh for the East Coast and Hertfordshire

Control Room Consortium.

Creating a standard specification for ICT equipment, with a focus on ‘fit for purpose, fit for use’ principle.


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Theme 5 - Collaborative Working: providing integrated tools to enable communication and collaboration between our people and others with whom they work. This theme recognises the importance of joined-up public services and acknowledges that those who are vulnerable to loss of life, or serious injury from emergency incidents, are also highly likely to have other vulnerabilities. This means that to support these members of the community, a joined-up approach and the sharing of data is an essential component. The appetite for data sharing varies considerably between partner agencies and this does present a challenge. To protect the community, we need access to data of those at risk so they can be provided with assistance and support. Similarly where, as part of our work, we want to sign-post members of the community to other agencies, the Service needs to ensure that in doing so does not contravene data protection and other similar legislation. Working with partner agencies brings us closer together, and it is important that our investment decisions around ICT enable this working to continue. The potential for joint investment around the delivery of ICT could bring benefits to our communities. Part of this collaborative working is the East Coast and Hertfordshire Control Room Consortium (ECHCRC) will provide the Service with a single command and control mobilising system that is used by four fire and rescue services and provides resilience to each of those partners. Working in this way shares knowledge and skills with partners and provides wider opportunities for collaborative working.

“Sharing data, information, and intelligence to support what the Service wants to

achieve, and deliver supporting technological

solutions that enable collaborative working.”

Key Areas of Focus: Ensuring that the necessary sharing agreements are in place to support the work

of our people.

Sharing non-personal, and incident related data, to support a wider understanding of the profile of risk in our communities.

Looking at ways to share expertise across partner agencies to improve business

processes and data quality.

Working in collaboration with partners to deliver specialist pieces of work where there is mutual benefit from doing so (e.g. Emergency Services Network).

Looking for wider opportunities to collaborate with ECHCRC partners to secure

economies of scale, build resilience and improve services to the public.


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Theme 6 - Security and Governance: ensuring systems and processes are secure and follow recognised practice. The Security and Governance theme focuses on the need to have appropriate controls in place to safeguard our information and other physical assets. This covers aspects of our day-to-day work around access control to systems, but includes those arrangements that need to be in place in response to threats to the communities. The overarching considerations for this theme are:

For information and other physical assets to be accessible to those who need it, and restricted where they do not;

Accurate and complete information with auditable changes;

Availability of information when and where is it needed.

The development of this area will be informed through the use of recognised best practice and standards.

“Ensure Confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability of Service Information, to ensure we can make our communities safer and respond effectively when called upon”

Key Areas of Focus:

Reviewing documentation to minimise the impact of security events and update contingency arrangements to ensure they remain fit for purpose.

Reviewing processes, training, and technology that reduces the potential impact of cyber-crime.

Refreshing work on the Information Security Management System, to reflect the

updated ISO27001 standard.

Maintaining Business Continuity Plans that are robust and tested to reduce the impact of interruption events.

Undertaking regular security assessments to confirm the adequacy of control measures.


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Longer Term Outlook

The quickening pace of technological change, means that ICT beyond the life of this version of the Plan, is likely to be very different, in ways that are difficult to foresee. The best way to predict the future is to help invent it. We see that those working to make communities safer will have access to enhanced information systems and technology that will allow:

A more rapid update of the risk profile, with a wider range of datasets, to help focus on vulnerability.

Communities to self-select a wide range of information to keep them safe through a variety of channels.

Technology that helps protect people from fires and other statutory emergency situations, and alerts the Service when assistance is needed.

Technology and applications, that make it as easy as possible for our people to access intelligence, which is always connected and can run for an extended period of time without needing to be recharged.

Details to be shared effortlessly between partner agencies where this is in the interests of the communities we serve.

Those in need of assistance will use a variety of different channels to request our attendance and ‘citizen journalists’ will be able to provide a view of the size and severity of an incident before we get there. Automated alerting systems – including for domestic/residential premises and vehicles – will be common place and raise the alarm which means a more speedy response can be provided. Our response to emergency incidents will be enhanced through a range of technologies that will reduce the potential harm to responding firefighters, make sure that those members of the public are moved to safety and that environmental impact is minimised.

This will be provided by:

Robot technology will be used in the most hostile environments.

Detailed walk-through models of buildings that are available as virtual and augmented reality platforms to support incident command.

Fire Engines and other responding vehicles with head-up display, providing an informative picture of the emergency situation, to help with the tactical planning which will include live-streamed images from the emergency incident.

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles that can provide, and transmit reconnaissance video and other information such as size, exact location, heat intensity, and also provide air and gas sampling to incident commanders.

Biometric information provided to incident commanders on the condition of firefighters to keep them safe, and personal positioning systems to identify the exact location with x, y and z coordinates.

A smooth and seamless flow of electronic information between all services involved in an emergency incident to assist in resolving the emergency quickly.

Intelligent buildings, vehicles, and systems, that automatically send information on the nature, extent, and exact location of an emergency incident, so we can be sure that we’re sending the right weight of response.

Our people will be able to connect into systems and work together in much more flexible ways then is currently possible. Applications will seamlessly talk to each other, and artificial intelligence will remove the need to perform basic routine tasks.

Humberside Fire and Rescue Service

Service Headquarters

Summergroves Way

Hull

HU4 7BB

Documents

Information & Communications Technology (ICT) Plan 2018-2021 · 2019-10-28 · Information & Communications Technology Plan 2018-21 Page 2 of 9 ICT Themes 2018/2021 The ICT Plan identifies