Privacy Policy
This privacy notice is for the use of customers and partners of the Sandwell Children’s Safeguarding Partnership. This is managed on behalf of the Partnership by Sandwell MBC/Sandwell Childrens Trust in fulfilment of their collective responsibility as a data controller under data protection law.
Sandwell Children’s Safeguarding Partnership uses your information to deliver our partnership arrangements and meet our obligations in relation to safeguarding across the Borough, which include but are not limited to:
- Developing policies and procedures for safeguarding and promoting the welfare of Sandwell’s children, including policies and procedures in relation to:
- The action to be taken where there are concerns about a child’s safety or welfare, including thresholds for intervention
- Training of persons who work with children or in services affecting the safety and welfare of children
- Recruitment and supervision of persons who work with children; the investigation of allegations concerning persons who work with children; the safety and welfare of children who are privately fostered; co-operation with neighbouring children’s services authorities and their partners.
- Communicating to persons and bodies within Sandwell to safeguard and promote the welfare of children, raising their awareness of how this can best be done and encouraging them to do so.
- Monitoring and evaluating the effectiveness of what is done by all partners individually and collectively to safeguard and promote the welfare of children and advising them on ways to improve.
- Participating in the planning of services for children within Sandwell.
- Undertaking reviews of serious cases and advising all partners on lessons to be learned.
- Audit activity and advising all partners on areas for improvement.
- Collecting and analysing information about each death with a view to identifying:
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- Any case giving rise to the need for a Child Safeguarding Practice Review; Any matters of concern affecting the safety and welfare of children in Sandwell; and
- Any wider public health or safety concerns arising from a particular death or from a pattern of deaths in that area; and
- Putting in place procedures for ensuring that there is a coordinated response within Sandwell to an unexpected death.
- Establish ways of analysing and interrogating data on safeguarding notifications and completed enquiries which increases Sandwell Children’s Safeguarding Partnerships understanding of prevalence of abuse and neglect locally which builds up a picture over time.
- Establish how Sandwell will hold partners to account and gain assurance of the effectiveness of its safeguarding arrangements.
- Determine arrangements for peer review and self-audit.
- Develop preventative strategies that aim to reduce instances of abuse and neglect in Sandwell.
- Identify types of circumstances giving grounds for concern and when they should be considered as a referral to the local authority as an enquiry.
- Develop strategies to deal with the impact of issues of race, ethnicity, religion, gender and gender orientation, sexual orientation, age, disadvantage and disability on abuse and neglect.
- Balance the requirements of confidentiality with the consideration that, to protect children, it may be necessary to share information on a “need to know” basis.
- Identify mechanisms for monitoring and reviewing the implementation and impact of policy and learning and development activities.
- Produce a strategic plan and an annual report.
- Evidence how partners have challenged one another and held other related local Partnerships to account.
- Promote multi-agency training and consider any specialist training that may be required.
Your information may be manually and/or digitally processed through our systems by people in the UK. Any persons with access to your information will follow strict adherence to Data Protection law, adequate safeguards and have appropriate authorisation.
You are entitled to know what personal data we use, why we use it, how we store it and for how long, and who we might share it with and why. Personal data is any information that provides details about an individual, the individual must be identifiable from the information, if the information is fully anonymised it is no longer classed as personal information.
Sandwell Children’s Safeguarding Partnership collect, process and retain a range of information about you.
This can be classed as either Personal Data or special category (sensitive) Personal Data and includes information such as:
- Biometric data (special category – further details below)
- Date of birth
- Details of criminal investigation or convictions
- Ethnicity (special category – further details below)
- Financial information
- Gender (special category – further details below)
- Health (physical/mental) information (special category – further details below)
- Mental capacity information (special category – further details below)
- Name, address and contact details including email address and telephone number
- Next of kin, name and contact details
- NHS Number and internal reference numbers
- Other Agencies involved
- Referral/Assessment information (special category – further details below)
- Relationships information
- Relevant case information
- Religion (special category – further details below)
- Risks and vulnerabilities (we will record information regarding whether a person/family is at risk of harm or require safeguarding in accordance with our thresholds) (special category – further details below)
- Sexual orientation (special category – further details below)
- Audio recording, CCTV and other photographic images
We will collect the information in several ways.
Some will be provided directly by you when you contact any organisation who is a member of the Safeguarding Partnership about a service. This may be when you visit offices, call or email an agency or when you contact us via our website or social media. A parent or guardian or other legal representative may also provide information.
The partner safeguarding organisations may also receive information from third parties such as friends or neighbours or other individuals you have interacted with.
Information will be collected from organisations such as the NHS, the Police, Schools and other Education Providers, other Councils, Housing Associations, and Government bodies such as HMRC or the Department of Work and Pensions.
The partners may also obtain information from certain external organisations or provide information to them in order to;
- verify the accuracy of the information supplied
- prevent or detect crime
- protect public funds from fraud
- Collect and make the best use of public funds
- To safeguard and protect children and young people
- comply with legal obligations
- assist with research and statistical purposes
Information collected in the above ways will be shared with the Sandwell Children’s Safeguarding Partnership, by the respective safeguarding partner organisations, in order to allow the Partnership to fulfil their functions and obligations.
The lawful basis under which we process your information and the linked reasons for processing are:
- The processing of information is necessary to cooperate with and conform to UK law or another legal obligations to which the Safeguarding Partners are subject, including but not limited to:
Primarily:
- The Children Act 2004
- The Care Act 2014
In addition to:
- Adoption and Children Act 2002;
- Anti-social behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014
- Care Planning, Placement and Case Review and Fostering Services (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2013;
- Care Standards Act 2000;
- Health and Social Care Act 2012
- Children Act 1989
- Children and Adoption Act 2006;
- Children and Families Act 2014;
- Children and Social Work Act 2017;
- Children and Young Persons Act 2008;
- Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence Act 2017
- Criminal Justice and Courts Act 2015
- Disability and Discrimination Act 2005
- Equality Act 2010
- Domestic Violence Crime and Victims Act 2004
- Domestic Violence Protection Orders 2014
- Education Act 2002;
- Education Act 2011
- Female Genital Mutilation Act 2003,
- Forced Marriage (Civil Protection) Act 2007
- Fostering Service Regulations 2011;
- Health & Safety at Work Act 1974
- Human Rights Act 1998
- Local Authority Social Services Act 1970;
- Mental Capacity Act 2005,
- Mental Health Act 1983/2007
- Modern Slavery Act 2015.
- Serious Crime Act 2015
- Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998
- Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Act 2006
- Sexual Offences Act 2003
- The purpose of processing is to carry out a task in the public interest or the exercise of official authority vested in the controller – for example when we share relevant information with partner organisations to enable us to continually develop and improve the services offered.
Sandwell Children’s Safeguarding Partnership collects and uses special category data to provide some services. Special category data is information which is deemed particularly sensitive, and which unlawful processing could create risks to you. The following information is classed as special category: Race, Ethnicity, Political Opinion, Religious or Philosophical Beliefs, Trade Union Membership, Genetic and Biometric Information, Health, and Sexual Orientation.
When using your information we must make sure that we have a lawful reason to do so. The reasons primary reasons to use special category information are:
- Processing is necessary for the purposes of carrying out obligations and exercising specific rights of the controller or of the data subject in the field of social protection law.
- Processing is necessary for reasons of substantial public interest.
In circumstances where none of the above lawful reasons apply we will only collect and use your information with your explicit consent. Please note you can withdraw your consent to this processing at any time by contacting us.
In order to deliver our partnership arrangements we may need to share your information with the following entities:
- Adult Social Care
- Care agencies
- Children’s Social Care
- City/District/Borough Councils
- Government departments – for example Department for Work and Pensions, Ministry of Justice, HMRC
- Education providers
- Health agencies and the NHS Trust
- Housing Associations
- Police
- National Probation Service
- Community Resolution Service
- Ambulance Service
- Fire Service
- Adoption Agencies
- Fostering Agencies
- Quality Care Commission
- Voluntary Sector Organisations and charities
There may also be occasion when we will share your information with relevant third parties when required to do so by law.
There are provisions in UK law that dictate how long we can keep your information.
Sandwell Children’s Safeguarding Partnership will only hold and archive your information in line with its corporate retention schedule which has been compiled in accordance with UK legislation such as, but not limited to, the Health and Social Care Act, the Public Records Act and the Local Government Act.
You have the following rights with regard to your personal information:
Right to be informed – You have the right to know the following:
- what information we intend to collect
- why we need your information
- the lawful basis under which we can process your information
- how we will process your information
- whether we share your information
- who we might share your information with
- your rights under the law
- how long we will retain your information and how you can contact us
Access to your information – If you would like to know what information we hold and process about you, the category of information, who we share your information with, to ascertain the accuracy of the information and the criteria we apply in processing your information, you can make a request to us in writing.
We should respond to your request within 30 days of receipt but if the request is complex and more time is required we will inform you in writing.
Rectification of your information – If it is established that information we hold about you is incorrect, you have the right to request that we correct this information.
Erasure of your information – In cases where the information we hold about you is no longer required in relation to the purpose for which it was collected and where there are no lawful grounds for holding your information, you can request an erasure of information.
The Right to Restrict processing –You can restrict us from using your information if you believe the data is inaccurate or if there are no lawful grounds for using the information but you do not want us to delete the information. In addition, you can prevent us from deleting information we no longer use or need if you require it for a legal claim or defence.
Following investigation, if it is determined that the right to restrict processing should not apply we will inform you of reasons for this before the restriction is lifted.
Right to Data Portability – You have the right to request that information we hold about you be transferred to another public authority or other controller. Your data portability request will have to be made in writing and we will assess your request in accordance with the provisions of the GDPR to ascertain if your request is covered under the law.
Our response will contain our decision regarding the viability of your request and asking you to choose between the following:
- If you want the information handed to you
- If you would like the information transferred directly to the public authority or other controller
Right to Object – If you object to Sandwell Children’s Safeguarding Partnership using your information in the ways detailed we will cease to process your information unless we can show there are legitimate reasons that override your interests.
Whether or not you have legitimate grounds to object to processing of your information, the Sandwell Children’s Safeguarding Partnership will respond to your request within one month stating that your request has been upheld or the reasons for not upholding your request if that is the case.
Automated Decision Making-You have the right not to be subject to a decision which affects you, which is solely based on automated processing. This will include profiling.
This right will not apply if the automated decision making is necessary in anticipation of entering into a contract or if it is authorised in law. You can give us explicit consent to be subject to automated decision making but you can remove this consent at any time.
Please be aware that the application of some of these rights is dependant upon the lawful basis for us to process your information. If you ask to enforce a right which is not applicable due to the reason for us processing the data we will explain the reasons for not upholding your request.
The Partnership consists of representatives from several organisations who all have responsibilities as data controllers with regard to the information you have provided. If you wish to exercise any of your rights or have any queries or concerns regarding the use of your information please contact the Data Protection Officer of the organisation you initially provided the information to.
Should you be dissatisfied with the response you receive, you can contact the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) with the details given below:
ICO Address:
Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire SK9 5AF
Email Address: Use the online form via this link https://ico.org.uk/global/contactus/email/
Telephone Numbers:
Calling from within the UK 0303 123 1113 (local rate) or 01625 545 745 if you prefer to use a national rate.
Calling from outside the UK +44 1625 545 745.