grant
Member
I was reading a recent document on the ACMA website
http://www.acma.gov.au/webwr/_assets/main/lib310661/13bobwaites.pdf
Bob Waites is a very senior NSW Police officer and is currently Assistant Commissioner, Operational Communications and Information Command. What I found most interesting is the suggestion from page 4 onwards in the section titled "Future Directions", that the Police are beginning to seriously look and entertain a move to the Government Radio Network frequency allocation, providing that there was sufficient radio spectrum to accomodate all their needs (which I understand in the past has been an issue, along with having access priority to the system).
Apparently a number of factors have caused the issue to be visited, but key among them is the recent decision by the 2007 World radio conference to reallocate 450-470Mhz as a telecommunication block, and a significant effort at national law enforcement level towards agreeing upon and setting up a common block of frequencies (ie multi-agency interoperability).
In fact there are a few whispers going around the moment that suggest that the police may have already agreed in principle to join the GRN network - I have heard the same thing from a number of radio techie folk that this maybe indeed the case. Whatever the situation it is probably 2 or 3 years off, given the need to vastly upgrade the communications trunking network to a) digital and b) extra capacity to support law enforcement. Even without the police I was reading in the NSW Governemt Feb 2007 submission on the spectrumwise website that the Sydney basin comms requirement future projection was at least 100 sites and 1200 voice channels, with an average of 12 frequencies per site
Grant
PS If indeed the police are joining the GRN I can see eventually encryption spreading to a large part of the NSW state for the police force - far larger than the current Greater Sydney area.
Other references:
http://www.spectrumwise.net/pdf/NSW Government.pdf.
http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/commun...s-000-NSW-Police/0,130061791,339288661,00.htm
http://www.acma.gov.au/webwr/_assets/main/lib310661/13bobwaites.pdf
Bob Waites is a very senior NSW Police officer and is currently Assistant Commissioner, Operational Communications and Information Command. What I found most interesting is the suggestion from page 4 onwards in the section titled "Future Directions", that the Police are beginning to seriously look and entertain a move to the Government Radio Network frequency allocation, providing that there was sufficient radio spectrum to accomodate all their needs (which I understand in the past has been an issue, along with having access priority to the system).
Apparently a number of factors have caused the issue to be visited, but key among them is the recent decision by the 2007 World radio conference to reallocate 450-470Mhz as a telecommunication block, and a significant effort at national law enforcement level towards agreeing upon and setting up a common block of frequencies (ie multi-agency interoperability).
In fact there are a few whispers going around the moment that suggest that the police may have already agreed in principle to join the GRN network - I have heard the same thing from a number of radio techie folk that this maybe indeed the case. Whatever the situation it is probably 2 or 3 years off, given the need to vastly upgrade the communications trunking network to a) digital and b) extra capacity to support law enforcement. Even without the police I was reading in the NSW Governemt Feb 2007 submission on the spectrumwise website that the Sydney basin comms requirement future projection was at least 100 sites and 1200 voice channels, with an average of 12 frequencies per site
Grant
PS If indeed the police are joining the GRN I can see eventually encryption spreading to a large part of the NSW state for the police force - far larger than the current Greater Sydney area.
Other references:
http://www.spectrumwise.net/pdf/NSW Government.pdf.
http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/commun...s-000-NSW-Police/0,130061791,339288661,00.htm
