A JOINT venture between two local authorities and Gwent Police is set to become a world leader.

The Blaenavon-based Shared Resource Service is owned by Monmouthshire County Council, Torfaen County Borough Council and Gwent Police and stores confidential data at a fraction of the cost of other data storage centres.

The system the councils and the police will be using is known as Microsoft Office 365, which enables the storage of confidential data over and above the levels currently available and takes advantage of technological enhancements over the Microsoft Cloud where less sensitive data can be stored.

The £3m high-spec, secure centre, part-funded by the National Assembly, is already attracting wide interest from at least four English local authorities.

At the building's opening in 2011 leader of Torfaen Council Councillor Bob Wellington remarked: "Where Blaenavon was once the heart of the industrial revolution, today marks the beginning of the digital revolution for the area."

And now in the latest move Monmouthshire's cabinet have approved an agreement with Microsoft that will see the council become the first in Wales to operate and store data in the Welsh Public Cloud.

Cloud technology means that information and IT systems can be accessed using an internet connection without the need to store all the data and software locally on servers.

The Welsh Public Cloud is a joint development by the Welsh Assembly, members of the Welsh public sector, the IT community and Microsoft and is designed to help public sector organisations take advantage of cloud technology as well as providing a higher security data storage facility for confidential and sensitive information.

Because Microsoft couldn't previously offer this high level of security via the Microsoft cloud the partners sought a new solution.

Now authorities will be able to store less sensitive information in the Microsoft cloud and the highly sensitive information can be stored in the secure data halls at the Blaenavon centre.

Leader of the Monmouthshire council, Councillor Peter Fox said: "We are pushing the boundaries with this project as Microsoft Office 365 offers real benefits and long-term savings."

Chief executive Paul Matthews added: "This is an excellent and unique scheme which, as far as we are concerned, has been upgraded and future proofed to the nth degree.

"This is where we can lead the way and other authorities will follow.

"At the recent 2013 Digital conference I was able to tell the leaders of British industry that we were well advanced with our digital plans. This is an astoundingly good news story."

Councillor Phil Murphy told members that the only two other major data storage centres were at Canary Wharf in London and in Reading.

"The centre in Blaenavon has such high standards it puts us at a real advantage. We've recently been told that some authorities store their data in portable buildings in car parks with leaking roofs."

Mr Matthews added: "We are open to working with other authorities and public sector organisations and a percentage of co-ownership has been factored into the business plan. It's not what it does, it's what we can make it do for the community.

"Our primary concern was for the security of our data and it wasn't our intention to make money, but working with others will definitely reduce our cost base even further."

Councillor Bob Greenland said: "The Welsh Government has indicated it hopes to standardise services throughout Wales to the system we have adopted."

Councillor Phil Hobson concluded: "We are providing greater, joined up working practices and as a result we are up there with Google and Amazon clouds as a world leader."