Criminal Justice IT opening cheque book

The UK government's £1.2bn criminal justice IT programme is looking for suppliers to deliver software and data hosting services for its main infrastructure.

The Criminal Justice Exchange will allow information sharing between the police, Crown Prosecution Service, Department for Constitutional Affairs, magistrates' courts, Youth Justice Boards and the National Offenders Management Service (NOMS). It will provide a single point of contact for case-related data held by the organisations that are linked up.

Suppliers have until 9 August 2004 to respond to tender notices covering Exchange IT. The Criminal Justice IT Unit, which is in charge of the procurement, wants an application software provider to further develop and integrate systems used so far in pilot projects.

So far, work on the Exchange is taking place in three pilots. Snaresbrook Crown Court is using Microsoft's .Net technology, the NOMS is using IBM's WebSphere Business Integration Message Broker, and a system developed by Sun Microsystems linking courts and the police is running in Warwickshire.

The data hosting provider will have to manage the migration of existing services and will have to support the ongoing operation of the Exchange. The system will "require high availability and reliability to a large number of disparate users", says the tender notice.

Suppliers will need to have a flexible approach, according to the CJIT Unit. "The CJS Exchange Programme is novel and complex and because it is an ongoing programme in the early stages of development it is likely to be subject to significant change and rapid growth," says the tender notice.

The Exchange could also extend to link up with other public bodies such as the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency and other organisations in the rest of the UK.