Spectrum Q&A – update from the President of British APCO

What is British APCO trying to achieve as regards spectrum?

What we are trying to achieve is a consolidated view from the public safety world – and that includes both commercial and public service sectors. We published a position paper last November which caused considerable debate and we were not sure if we could reach a consolidated view. Since then we’ve been working very hard to do this, and in the main there is mainly agreement about the way forward. We’ve tried to include comments from everyone who has been involved and have just finished the final paper. We’ve had help recently from Michelle Wakefield, who was previously with Motorola, Vodafone and Ofcom. Her technical expertise with spectrum has been invaluable for this work.

What kind of research have you carried out as regards spectrum?

In September we launched a questionnaire that forms part of a research project into interoperability that is currently being undertaken by the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) and British APCO.

The aim of the research is to understand what communications are mission critical to emergency services, and which need to remain operational even when other communication systems fail during large-scale incidents such as the 2007 summer floods or the 7 July 2005 terrorist attacks on the London Underground. It will also help to understand where failures have occurred in the past, and what the reasons for those failures have been.

Are there any areas of concern for you as regards ESMCP?

We believe there are some potential risks in the short-term roll out of the Emergency Services Network as the provision of mission-critical voice (MCV) over 4G/LTE is untested and the relevant technical standards are not all yet in place. If the ESN runs purely over the commercial networks there could be also be issues with coverage and resilience, as these networks are not currently built to be as robust as the TETRA one has been. That said, it is feasible to overcome these risks by ensuring there is sufficient control to ensure that we don’t receive a lesser service and that a MCV service is provided.

And looking further into the future?

In the longer-term there is a plan to release some spectrum in the 700Mhz band. This is useful as it provides good coverage both geographically and in-building (something TETRA was less able to do as it worked in a lower frequency band). We believe the government should make provision for some of this spectrum to be made available for use by the public safety community. This will not only provide some additional capacity – critical as we will see the use of data grow exponentially over the next few years – but also provide greater opportunity for interoperability in a global sense.

Do you have a message for British APCO members?

Our members should be aware of the potential risks and issues around the migration from TETRA to 4G/LTE. We fully believe it’s the right way forward for public safety and that the UK is likely to be a world leader – as was the case with the TETRA network – in this respect. However, people need to understand the issues and make sure they are asking the right questions to ensure the user requirements are appropriately delivered. We don’t want any lesser service than we’ve been used to – and moving forward the 4G/LTE solution can only improve things.