Police.uk gets 400m hits

James Brokenshire, the Home Office minister for crime prevention, has said the government's crime mapping website has received nearly 400 million hits since its launch last month. He said the high level of usage of the official crime mapping website demonstrated the significant public appetite for this type of information. He was responding to a parliamentary question from Conservative MP Richard Graham about the police.uk web service, which aims to provide a snapshot of crime and anti-social behaviour on every street in England and Wales. Brokenshire said the government had spent £300,000 implementing police.uk, and that these costs had been kept to a minimum. More than 7,000 people were asked for their views on local crime information, including crime maps, as part of the development process, he said. The public can continue to offer their views through the site's feedback facility on the website. Graham wanted to know how hoax phone calls to emergency services were shown on police.uk, and Brokenshire revealed that they were recorded as anti-social behaviour. All data about crime and anti-social behaviour on the site is provided by individual police forces, which are, therefore, responsible for the accuracy of the data provided. "Greater transparency is at the heart of our commitment to open up government to greater scrutiny," said Brokenshire. "This is why, for the first time ever, the government have provided communities with access to monthly street level crime and anti-social behaviour data alongside key information on neighbourhood policing." Problems shortly after the launch of police.uk on 1 February meant the site was temporarily unavailable. The Home Office put this down to the overwhelming number of hits. A spokeswoman said that by 10.00am that day the site had already had 4.5m hits. This article is published by Guardian Professional. For updates on public sector IT, join the Government Computing Network here.