Fragile 111 system poses fundamental risk - but replacement delayed again

Replacement of the increasingly fragile 111 emergency call system has been delayed again - despite reports saying the issues pose a fundamental risk to the public.

Deaths and injuries related to system constraints or failures have been detailed in police reports for several years, even as police have battled to replace it.

"The 111-emergency call system is growing increasingly fragile," said one report this year.

"The fragility and governance around the 111 platform presents a fundamental risk to emergency response."

A newly-released briefing from a year ago to Police Minister Mark Mitchell said the system was vulnerable in seven key ways.

"These vulnerabilities create risks for public safety and first responder safety."

Replacement options were due to Mitchell by July this year, but have been pushed back to February.

Spark backs shift

The initial call-taking is not done by emergency responders, but by telecommunications giant Spark. This can cause delays when people get repeatedly asked for details and Spark is backing the move for change.

The current system was hugely limited by 1990s technology built on a 1950s model, such as only being able to take voice calls, not texts.

Three years ago, real examples of terrible consequences were outlined by police to the government.

Documents released to RNZ under the Official Information Act revealed that in one case a woman was stabbed to death by a partner who overheard her making a 111 call. She had no way of alerting police in a way that "would not have [been] detected".

In another case, a man drowned in the time it took an ambulance and paramedic to get there - but police and Surf Rescue who were at the beach did not get the call.

The lack of text or options other than speech was among the seven weaknesses in the briefing on 111 calls.

Crowding the channel

Another weakness was that automated 111 calls from "mobile apps, personal alarms, smart watches and cars" were increasingly crowding the channel, sometimes for good reason - but often not - as commercial entities used the system "to deliver services to their customers".

"NZ Police's own intelligence analysis of Apple Crash Detection autonomous calls was that 75-89 percent were not an emergency event," said the Mitchell briefing.

"There are no regulatory controls to ensure only genuine emergencies are reported through to the ECS [emergency call system], which means people in a genuine emergency may not get a timely response due to the potential for first responders to be diverted to events that are not emergencies."

'Very uncommon' ownership structure

Governance was a problem because the initial call taking is not even owned or done by emergency responders but by telco Spark. A Spark 111 call centre asks a caller what emergency service they want, then transfers the call (it goes by default to police if it is not clear).

Spark is backing a change to shift the system.

It was fully committed to operating the system - "We take our responsibility for it extremely seriously" - but the company also "appreciate the end-to-end system is under stress", it told RNZ on Wednesday.

"We support a review, and we would expect it to consider moving" the initial call answering point from a business like Spark to a public-service model which could then "be properly integrated into emergency services' operations as an initial triage point rather than simply a call transfer service".

On the smart-tech auto-calling front, Spark told RNZ it can handle the extra volumes. But once these calls were transferred, police then had to deal with them in the same queue as real emergency calls.

'The current system continues to operate effectively'

The current system originated in the 1950s and was hugely limited by its old 1990s technology base.

Successive governments have failed to fund a replacement.

NZ Police set up a cross-agency group to restart looking for one last year, called the Future of the Emergency Contact System (FOECS).

Police prepared a media release in case anyone asked about the group, which in FAQ-style said: "Is the current system not working? The current system continues to operate effectively."

RNZ has asked NZ Police for comment, including on why the media release said the system was effective when a performance review in April stated: "111 only supports voice calls - it does not support text, video, or social media reporting. This makes it increasingly unfit-for-purpose, particularly for some emergency types where speaking may not be possible or safe."

'Fragmented and outdated'

The other vulnerabilities Mitchell was told about in the existing system were:

• A "fragmented and outdated legislative framework" in the face of tech advances.
• No single agency overseeing the whole system or its development.
• The "very uncommon practice internationally" of have a telco as the first point of contact.
• Barriers faced by rural, disabled, non-voice or non-mainstream language users.
• A limited ability to respond to innovation and "threats" such as from cyber attack.
• Fragile infrastructure vulnerable in big storms.

There was an over-arching risk the public would lose trust and confidence in the system, the minister was told.

Replacing it aligned with the government's "law and order focus" and would help the emergency agencies deliver better value to taxpayers.

A police plan earlier this year said the FOECS group had agreed on "an initial problem definition and scope". The group includes MBIE and telcos.

The plan gave an expected completion date of replacing the system as 2027-28. RNZ has asked police for an update on that.

Spark said it would continue to meet its existing obligations and operate the initial call answering point (ICAP) "safely and reliably throughout any transition".