Major Incident
Roles and Responsibilities

Head of Operational Policy & Support division (OPSD)

Roles

The Head of OPSD organises and chairs the major incident progress group (MIPG) and ensures that it meets annually or more frequently as required.

S/he supports the MIPG in the testing, monitoring and reviewing HSE's Major Incident Response arrangements.

As chair of MIPG, s/he is responsible to the Executive for monitoring the implementation of recommendations from a major incident investigation and any policy and procedure review and reports to the Executive on the discharge of the recommendations.

S/he revises and issues, as appropriate, HSE’s published Major Incident Response arrangements on behalf of the HSE Executive/Board.

The Head of OPSD also ensures HSE’s duty officer system operates effectively.

Responsibilities

The head of OPSD ensures that:

• an effective telephone contact system is in place to enable duty holders, members of the public and emergency services to contact HSE in the event of a major incident.
• sufficient trained duty officers are available to receive out-of-hours notifications of major incidents in line with current instructions on HSE’s duty officer system.
• provides and maintains the duty officer manual which contains the Directorate/Divisional contacts and the senior officers list for major incident notifications and civil contingencies response.
• incorporates sector specific guidance provided by Directorates/Divisions into the duty officer manual.
• the out-of-hours telephone contact system is periodically tested, monitored and reviewed.

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