One year on from the launch of the Scottish Dog Control Database, Fiona Gray, Product Manager in the IS Digital Public Services Team, looks back at the success story of this valuable resource.
Launched in February 2022, the Scottish Dog Control Database has been a success story for the Improvement Service and our partners, and more importantly has had a positive impact on the communities it was designed to help protect.
Scotland now has the first national Dog Control Database in the UK, bringing together Dog Control Notice (DCN) records from all 32 local authorities into one centralised online database that is easily accessible by councils and Police Scotland via the dcn.scot website.
Out of control dogs can cause fear or even serious injury to Scottish citizens and their dogs. When dealing with an incident, local authorities and Police Scotland need to understand the background of the offending dog, such as any previous Dog Control Notices in place, to make informed decisions and apply the correct restrictions.
The Digital Public Services Team at the IS developed the Scottish Dog Control Database in response to demand from and with the support of local authorities and the Scottish Government. The creation of the database was a commitment from the Scottish Government in their Programme for Government in 2021-22, and the necessary legislation to allow for data sharing between organisations was passed at the end of 2021.
Prior to dcn.scot going live, Police Scotland were unable to access data about dog control notices and had to rely on phoning council staff during office hours or via email, which impeded their ability to react to dog incidents, which can often be reported out of office hours. dcn.scot allows police officers in the field to save precious time searching for a dog or dog guardian’s background when they are called to a dog incident, as well as avoiding the need to contact a council.
What made the old system even more complicated was the different formats used to store information about Dog Control Notices across all 32 local authorities; councils used everything from paper notebooks to Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, Uniform platform, Sharepoint or Civica.
The Improvement Service was commissioned by the Scottish Government to undertake a scoping study in November 2020 to develop a better understanding of the current approach to Dog Control Notice management. This involved significant engagement with Scottish local authorities and other stakeholders. As the project progressed to a Proof of Concept, six councils and Police Scotland volunteered to work with us on designing the national database, and this process was so successful that we were commissioned to deliver the national database.
The Digital Public Services Team liaised with councils on standardising the data fields and how it would be held in the database, as well as how they would be able to upload their existing DCN data into the new database. We developed a single template and creating a bulk upload option into the new database, so larger numbers of DCNs could be uploaded at once, making it as easy as possible for councils to add the data which makes dcn.scot such an important asset.
dcn.scot has been received incredibly favourably by all users. Officers within local authorities and Police Scotland now have 24/7 access to DCN data, so they can search for microchip numbers and find out instantly if a DCN has been issued to a dog’s owner. For the first time they can now see all data across Scotland, and they can now transfer records to a new council when they’ve been made aware of a house move.
We developed a dashboard view, showing the DCN statistics, as well as an interactive map so they can see where a dog owner has been issued with a DCN, as well as identifying any “hotspots”. The search facility means they can quickly access any records they require, and the addition of stock dog breed photos helps them identify dogs involved in incidents. The Scottish Government are also now issued with automated reports from dcn.scot, which cuts down on the previous time they spent chasing stakeholders for statistics.
For the first time, councils and Police Scotland have 24/7 access to DCN data, which was previously hidden in separate councils in disparate silos. Not only does this save organisations time and money but helps them to respond more effectively to incidents involving animals subject to Dog Control Notices, keeping our communities safe.