The role of Central Government can vary dependent on which way the political wind is blowing and can range from policy advisor right through to the direct instigator of those policies.   Irrespective of the way the pendulum is swinging, the need to communicate with the multiple agencies that sit outside of the centre is essential, since they are the ones that carry out policy decisions.

The bulk of these communications will have an address component and it is the UPRN that can assist in ensuring that these lines of communication are as accurate as ever. With the UPRN becoming the de facto identifier of property throughout the public sector, its use in Central Government will significantly aid the way they can work with all other governmental and non-governmental bodies from the national parks, through to the police.

How Central Government can access and use the UPRN

Accessing the UPRN is a simple process through using Symphony SinglePoint that can allow systems to access the data via web services and even all individuals through either the internet or intranet.

The different roles of Central Government departments means that the use of address data can vary tremendously. The UPRN is derived from the National Address Gazetteer and the accuracy of addressing that it provides will be of benefit to all.

In addition to this accuracy is its position as an enabler of Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Existing databases can be matched to the National Address Gazetteer using Symphony iMatch, which can be used to 'write back' not only the UPRN, but also precise geographical coordinates.