Emergency workers could use drones as “first responders” to incidents as part of a £230 million roll out of new technology to speed up police response times. Chancellor Jeremy Hunt said during his Budget statement that victims could report crimes by video calls as part of the proposed measures.
Mr Hunt, on his bid to make public services “more efficient”, said: “Police officers waste around eight hours a week on unnecessary admin – with higher productivity, we could free up time equivalent to 20,000 officers over a year.
“So we will spend £230 million rolling out time and money saving technology which speeds up police response time by allowing people to report crimes by video call and where appropriate use drones as first responders.”
Mr Hunt said £170 million would be used to fund “non-court resolution, reduce reoffending and digitise the court process”.
Last year it was revealed some police forces would trial the use of drones in deployment in some reports of crimes.
This could involve using them to provide swift surveillance of an incident and track suspects at the scene.
If successful, drones could be stationed on buildings and operated remotely to scenes to give the police early information.
Increased use of AIs such as for facial recognition is also to be funded within the £230million money pot, the Treasury said.
During the budget, the Chancellor confirmed a 2p cut in national insurance as the centrepiece of the giveaway.
The change from April will be worth an average £450 for workers and £350 for the self-employed.
When combined with a previous reduction which came into effect in January it will be worth £900 for 27 million workers and £650 for two million self-employed.
Mr Hunt told MPs in the Commons: “That means the average earner in the UK now has the lowest effective personal tax rate since 1975 and one that is lower than in America, France, Germany or any G7 country.”
