The Government Centre for Security

The Government Centre for Security is a state budget unit subordinate to the Prime Minister. It was activated on 2 August 2008 and was established under the Act of 26 April 2007 on crisis management (Article 10) and the regulation of the Prime Minister of 10 July 2008 on organisation and course of operation of the Government Centre for Security. The idea of the establishment of the institution was the construction of an effective and comprehensive system of crisis management thanks to which it shall be possible to prevent crises and in the event of their occurrence, through professional actions, to minimise their effects. In the polish administration system this is a new solution, because there was constructed a supraministerial structure whose objective is to optimise and uniform the perception of threats by particular ministries and ipso facto to increase the degree of capability of coping with difficult situations by competent services and bodies of public administration. The Centre provides service of the Cabinet, the Prime Minister, the Government Team for Crisis Management (GTCM) and the minister in charge of the interior with relation to crisis management and functions as the national centre of crisis management.
Pursuant to the Act on crisis management of 26 April 2007 the Government Centre for Security is in charge of:

civil planning;
monitoring potential threats;
the agreement of crisis management plans drawn up by ministers managing actions of governmental administration and by managers of central offices;
preparing the activation, in the event of the occurrence of threats, procedures connected with crisis management;
preparing projects of assessments and positions of the Government Team for Crisis Management;
technical and organisational preparation and service of works of the Government Team for Crisis Management;
ensuring coordination of information policy of public administration bodies during a crisis situation;
cooperating with organisational entities, sections and units of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the European Union and other international organisations in charge of crisis management and protection of critical infrastructure;
organising and conducting trainings and exercises in the field of crisis management and participating in national and international exercises;
ensuring an exchange of information between national and foreign bodies and structures of crisis management;
fulfilling tasks of permanent duty within defence readiness of the country;
fulfilling tasks within counteracting, preventing and liquidating effects of terrorist events;
cooperating with the Head of the Internal Security Agency in the field of preventing, counteracting and removing effects of terrorist events;
conducting planning and programme tasks within protection of critical infrastructure, including drawing up and updating a functional annexe to the National Plan of Crisis Management concerning protection of critical infrastructure as well as cooperating, as a national contact point, with institutions of the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and other Member States in the area of protecting the crisis infrastructure;
preparing a management project of the Prime Minister specified in Article 7 (4) of the Act on crisis management;
informing, in accordance with the competence, entities stipulated in Article 8 (2 and 3) of the Act on crisis management, about potential threats as well as actions taken by competent bodies;
cooperating with crisis management centres of public administration bodies.

The Government Centre for Security is also a part of the system of task implementation in the field of counteracting, preventing and liquidating effects of terrorist events. In this area it cooperates with the Head of the Internal Security Agency. To the basic tasks of the Centre, subject to competences of the Counter-Terrorist Centre of the Internal Security Agency belongs an analysis of threats based on data obtained from all possible “crisis centres” functioning within public administration and based on data from international partners. Tasks in the field of counteracting, preventing and removing effects of terrorist events are conducted in cooperation with governmental organisation bodies competent in such cases, in particular with the Head of the Internal Security Agency.

A very important issue with regard to terrorist threats is undoubtedly the protection of critical infrastructure of the State. The Director of the Government Centre for Security on the basis of detailed criteria in cooperation with appropriate ministers in charge of systems draws up a uniform list of objects, installations, devices and services which are part of critical infrastructure divided into systems and informs about entering on the list their owners, independent and dependent holders who have an obligation to protect them. Public administration bodies, independent and dependent holders of objects, installations or devices of critical infrastructure are obliged to immediately deliver to the Head of the Internal Security Agency possessed information on terrorist threats for this critical infrastructure, significant in terms of security of the State, and also actions which can lead to a threat to life and health of people, large properties, national heritage or environment. Within the cooperation, the Head of the Internal Security Agency informs the Director of the Government Centre for Security about the receipt of information on a possibility of occurring a crisis situation being a result of a terrorist event endangering the critical infrastructure, people’s life or health, large properties, national heritage or environment.

Furthermore, the Government Centre for Security is in charge of developing optimal solutions occurring in crisis situations and also of coordinating the flow of information about threats. Within this scope, the Government Centre for Security carries out its tasks by drawing up a catalogue of threats, monitoring threats, activating crisis management procedures at the national level, conducting planning and programme activities in the field of crisis management and critical infrastructure protection, supervising cohesion of crisis responding procedures, organising and carrying out trainings and exercises in crisis management, cooperating at the international level, in particular with the NATO and the EU within crisis management.