FOI 769-2024 / Aug 2024 / IT expenditure
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION REQUEST REFERENCE NO: FOI-769-2024
I write in connection with your request for information which was received on 28th August 2024 as follows:
I would be grateful if you could provide the following details regarding your police force’s IT expenditure for the past three fiscal years (from 2021/22 to 2023/24):
- Total IT Expenditure:
- Please provide the overall IT expenditure for each of the last three fiscal years.
- Software Expenditure:
- Please provide the total spend on software for each of the last three fiscal years. This should include initial software licence fees, software maintenance fees, and subscription fees but should exclude associated services such as installation.
- Software Expenditure within Investigation Departments:
- Please provide a breakdown of the total spend on software, as defined above, specifically within investigation departments for each of the last three fiscal years. This should relate to software primarily used by investigation teams, as opposed to being used across the wider police force.
- If possible, please provide a breakdown of the total spend on software, as defined above, specifically within each investigation department (e.g. cyber crime, economic crime, etc) listed above for each of the last three fiscal years. This should relate to software primarily used by investigation teams, as opposed to being used across the wider police force.
Please accept my sincere apologies for the delay in providing the response to your request and for any inconvenience that this may have caused you. Please find the Warwickshire Police response set out below.
Please see the below Revenue costs.
Q1 response: Total ICT (Digital Services) excluding Pay (employee) costs:
|
2021/22 |
£9,733,357 |
|
2022/23 |
£8,483,374 |
|
2023/24 |
£8,321,967 |
Q2 response: Software costs:
|
2021/22 |
£2,610,060 |
|
2022/23 |
£2,228,599 |
|
2023/24 |
£2,740,521 |
Q3 response: The business area has advised that it is not possible to provide a breakdown for investigative areas only. They have stated that the software budget and expenditure is the largest and most complex of all the Digital Services budgets, and there is no way of identifying costs purely for areas involved in investigations. In order to attempt to determine spend in relation to software used in investigation departments it would involve in depth reviews of software used in different areas and all invoices across the period. The work involved would exceed the cost threshold of £450, which equates to 18 hours work at a standard rate of £25 per hour, as stated in the Freedom of Information (Fees and Appropriate Limit) Regulations 2004.
In accordance with section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, this letter acts as a Refusal Notice for this request.
In accordance with Section 16 of the Act, I have a duty to provide advice and assistance in relation to refining your request; however, I am unable to suggest a way to do this within the fees limit for the time period.
Every effort has been made to ensure that the information provided is as accurate as possible.
Your attention is drawn to the below which details your right of complaint.
Should you have any further enquiries concerning this matter, please write or
email the Freedom of Information Unit quoting the reference number above.
Yours sincerely
Freedom of Information Officer
Freedom of Information Unit
Warwickshire Police
PO Box 4
Leek Wootton
Warwickshire
CV35 7QB