The service is aimed at helping police forces to deliver their services against a backdrop of budgetary pressures exacted by the coalition Government as it tries to tackle the national debt.
Police forces are increasingly contracting out non-core activities and, in direct response, MITIE has now expanded the range of services it offers to forces.
These services now include custody services, detainee escorting and the provision of modular police cells.
In the future, these services may be extended to provide support for door-to-door inquiries, scenes of crime management and bail management.
Identification of new outsourcing opportunities
The new MITIE unit, to be led by Alex Boddy, is working with police forces to identify new outsourcing opportunities that will create efficiencies and safeguard frontline services.
Boddy told SMT Online: “Today’s unprecedented financial demands on all forces require really innovative thinking to make budgets stretch further. We’ve developed many ways to help forces operate more efficiently.”
He added: “We can provide support and deliver many non-core tasks normally undertaken by police officers to the same high standards, which will free up warranted officers for core frontline services.”
Boddy, who has joined as MITIE as director of Police Support Services, boasts over 13 years’ industry experience (and has spent time managing outsourced contracts for criminal justice agencies including security, facilities management, custody and forensic medical services).
Expansion of MITIE’s security offering
MITIE, of course, is one of the leading security providers in the UK, and employs 12,000 officers in the course of delivering 4,000 security contracts across 10,000 sites.
This initiative further expands MITIE’s security offering following the recent recruitment of Brett Lovegrove (former head of counter-terrorism at the City of London Police) as a key advisor, not to mention the development of its state-of-the-art security centre – dubbed MITEC – which will open in Northern Ireland later this year.
