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for asking advice or learning from other del- egates, and as we always say, as our feedback sheets tell us, you really can’t afford to miss it. We shall also be presenting our annual awards so if you consider someone or some authority that should be recognised for their achievements please let me know (peter@cct- vusergroup.com).


N. Ireland CCTV I hope this short article will be a prelude to a


more detailed article in a future issue as space is limited in this issue. I was invited to NI for a meeting and took the opportunity to return to some of the CCTV systems I had visited many years ago. It was a coincidence, but just before this visit more than one CCTV system in England was under threat of closure, and I had been asked about systems that had closed and what effect that had on crime levels, Lisburn in Northern Ireland was one of the very few I was aware of.


RISEN FROM THE ASHES


During the Great Rebellion of 1641, the town of Lisnagarvey was reduced to ashes and the name began to change to that of Lisburn, but in 1707, another great fire halted the growth of Lisburn. Once again it was reduced to ashes, this time even the great castle falling to the flames. So Lisburn is no stranger to responding posi- tively to major problems, but in 2008 the pub- lic area CCTV system was turned off due to budget constraints. Within three months, crime in the city centre had risen by 33 per cent. This was unacceptable and following an independent review Lisburn City Council made a decision to fully support the public area CCTV, doubling the original funding to the system and agreeing a three-year funding commitment.


Whilst there have since been budget cuts, these are at sensible levels, and with a willingness to fund upgrades, a new Cathexis digital system and Meyertech Zone Vu controls have been installed and all 33 cameras upgraded in the last two and a half years. As a result, crime has gone down below the pre-closure level and continues decreasing, and there are plans to expand the system. The cameras not only cover Lisburn but the neighbouring areas of Dunmurray, Hillsborough


and Moira as well as two cameras at the hospital.


The CCTV System is man- aged by Lisburn City Centre Management through an SLA with Lisburn Commerce Against Crime.


Gavin Campbell, who man- ages the CCTV system showed us around the control room locat- ed within Lisburn police station. Whilst it is not monitored 24/7, the 120 hours per week has been based on crime pattern analysis by the police. In September last year, Lisburn Commerce Against Crime, realising the importance


Mercury Security control room


of good CCTV personnel, brought the monitor- ing staff in house, with generally one duty civil- ian operator.


All operators have had professional training and are SIA licensed as an essential criterion, and they have linked with retailers against crime with 60 members on the radio system and the clubs which operate after 11pm and also have access to Airwave radio. This combined by an excellent working relationship with Lisburn Police has helped the system function so effectively. These are major lessons that any authority considering closure of their system should bear in mind. I understand that Blackpool turned off their cameras at the end of March and I hope that crime levels are being monitored after the closure so accurate statistics can be developed illustrating the effectiveness of public area CCTV .


MERCURY SECURITY


Apparently there are 64 Alarm Receiving Centres (ARCs) in the UK, of which I have probably visited only about half a dozen in the last two decades! So it really was a novelty to visit the Mercury Security ARC and see at firsthand how the system works and how impressive the facility is.


Located in a business park the building is as impressive as any international company HQ, which of course is what it is, with a welcoming reception with brochures on the services they offer which include details of Tavcom training facilities when training in NI.


The company was formed in 2001 and Francis Cullen, the son of the founder and someone who has been with the company from the beginning, showed us around. The company now has about 190 staff, split between Northern Ireland, the Republic and the mainland, and currently has 64 cameras providing security to the building, and mobile response teams for incidents at their customers’ properties. Now, whilst the prime reason for the


Lisburn CCTV control room


visit was to look at the ARC, it would be inappropriate to give details of the con- struction and precautionary measures, save to say that in the 80s and 90s I was involved in major civil emergency


Spring 2013 6


planning including LA bunkers in the event of nuclear war, but not one of those I had visited were as secure as this ARC!


It is constructed to BS5979 Category 2, is NSI Gold, IS 228 & SR 41 accredited, approved by the Anti-Terrorism Branch, and in the event of having to shut down a backup ARC takes over. All employees are ex-service personnel and access to the ARC, not surprisingly, is very strictly controlled.


When we were finally admitted, the technol- ogy amazed me and frankly lost me, as it is all ‘new age technology’. They were the first ARC to embrace the concept and implement a cloud infrastructure with four monitors at each of the four workstations at present but expansion to provide another four workstations is in progress to support their rapid growth into the vertical markets they have identified.


Alarm handling is a typical service, together with remote CCTV monitoring using Immix, the ‘new kid on the block for CCTV monitoring’. It was interesting to see snow falling in an indus- trial estate they were monitoring in Boston USA. Sentinel Plus is used for monitoring of Intruder alarms, medical devices, building management systems and lone workers.


Whilst everything is recorded on the local DVRs and retained for 31 days, every hour the systems upload to the ‘Cloud’ storage for long term storage, including all incident manage- ment reports. They have also developed an incident reporting and investigation manage- ment system which is quite unique and will be launched on the 1st May to their existing end users, giving them real-time information via their web portal.


In talking to Francis, it was clear that for them


it’s all about best practice in everything they do, from innovation and service delivery to evolving staff training programmes, sustainability, and longevity – which are key contributory factors if they are to achieve their goal of being at the forefront of British and international security. When Francis finished showing us around, he left me with these words that stuck on me: ‘It is not our aim to be the biggest but we will not settle for any less than being the best in what we do’.


Issue sponsor www.securitynewsdesk.com


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