Single Non Emergency Number

1.  The Home Office is seeking expressions of interest from borough/police partnerships to join the second wave national non-emergency number (101) service by 2 June 2006 (for roll out of a service in 2007).

2.  The development of a successful London service is likely to require pan-London coordination because:

• Promotion of the service will cross borough boundaries;
• Economies of scale and increased effectiveness can be realised by pooling resources.

The Metropolitan Police have indicated that whilst they support the concept of a single primary call handling level, they are not able to offer to run such a service. Nevertheless they would be key partners for the service, with the boroughs.

3.  There are a number of possible models which could be followed, principally those based either on a central call handling facility or on using borough call centres. The GLA has proposed a partnership bid for London based on single primary call handling level for 101 calls in London (i.e. a triage model). In the initial stage, up to 6 boroughs would be invited to operate as pilots, receiving calls via a centrally operated call centre (possibly run by TfL).