A privacy notice is a statement that describes how the Council collects, uses, retains and discloses personal information. Different organisations sometimes use different terms and it can be referred to as a privacy statement, a fair processing notice or a privacy policy.
To ensure that we process your personal data fairly and lawfully we will inform you of how we use your data including, but not limited to:
- How it will be used
- With whom it will be shared and
- That Stafford Borough Council is the data controller for information we collect and process
For specific enquiries regarding personal data which we process you can contact the Data Protection Officer on email dpo@staffordbc.gov.uk or at Civic Centre, Riverside, Stafford ST16 3AQ.
If you wish to complain about how your personal information has been handled by Stafford Borough Council then please contact the Data Protection Officer in the first instance using the details above. If you are not satisfied you can submit a formal complaint to the Council.
Finally, you can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office at: The Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF, Tel: 0303 123 1113 or you can visit their website at ico.org.uk.
Departmental and subject specific Privacy Notices, which hold the detail about how we handle and process your personal information, can be found via department specific links on this page.
Overview
Stafford Borough Council is committed to compliance with Data Protection legislation. Keeping your personal information accurate and secure is a vital part of providing efficient services to you.
The council will only use the information it holds about you for the purpose you provided it except in the circumstances outlined in this notice. It will also only collect the minimum information necessary to fulfil that purpose.
When you provide information please be aware that the council is required to share your information, on occasion, between different sections of the council. Where required it may also be shared with other agencies to help reduce crime or investigate fraud. An example of this is in reducing Housing Benefit fraud and involves the council sharing/comparing data from other departments to ensure that claimants are not claiming illegally.
The council also works with other councils and community organisations and sometimes needs to share information with them in order to deliver your services. However, the council will not supply these organisations with your information unless it is satisfied that equal measures are in place to protect the information from unauthorised access. The council will also not supply your information to any organisation for marketing purposes without your prior consent.
The council has a responsibility to promote social wellbeing and works in partnership with other councils and agencies such as the Police, Fire and Rescue Service, the voluntary services and the Health Service in order to preserve life, reduce accidents, reduce crime and disorder and improve health. To promote this social wellbeing the council may need to share your personal and sensitive information with other councils and partner agencies.
In all circumstances we will only share your data where the law demands or allows.
Your Rights
Data protection legislation provides the following rights for individuals:
The right to be informed
- You have the right to be informed about the collection and use of your personal data such as the purposes for processing your personal data, retention periods for that personal data, and who it will be shared with. This is provided when you provide us with your personal information and also within the privacy notices on this webpage
- If we obtain your personal data from other sources, we will provide you with privacy information within a reasonable period of obtaining the data and no later than one month. This will only happen where you have not already been informed that your data will be passed to us
- There are a few circumstances when we are not required to provide you with privacy information, such as if you have already been supplied with the information or if it would involve a disproportionate effort to provide it to you
The right of access
Gives you the right to:
- confirmation that your data is being processed;
- access to your personal data
The right to rectification
- You have the right to have inaccurate personal data rectified, or completed if it is incomplete.
The right to erasure
- In some circumstances you have the right to have personal data erased (also known as the ‘the right to be forgotten’).
- The right to erasure exists where:
- the personal data is no longer necessary for the purpose which it was originally collected or otherwise processed, or
- If it was collected by your consent and not processed under any other lawful basis.
The right to restrict processing
You have the right to restrict the processing of your personal data where:
- you contest the accuracy of your personal data and the council needs to verify its accuracy before further processing takes place;
- the data has been unlawfully processed and you oppose erasure of the data and request restriction of its use instead;
The right to data portability
This generally applies to instances where you wish to 'move' to another service provider - e.g. moving banks or phone providers. The right to data portability allows individuals to obtain and re-use their personal data for their own purposes across different services or organisations.
The right to object
You have a right to object to the processing of your personal data on “grounds relating to your particular situation”. This right only applies where personal data is being processed on the basis that processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority, or is necessary for the purposes of a legitimate interest pursued by the Council. On receipt of such an objection, the Council would need to demonstrate that its compelling legitimate grounds for the processing overrides the interests or the fundamental rights and freedoms of the data subject.
Website Visitors
When you provide your consent we use Google Analytics to help analyse the use of our website. This analytical tool uses 'cookies', which are text files placed on your computer, to collect standard Internet log information and visitor behaviour information in an anonymous form.
The information generated by the cookie about your use of the website is transmitted to Google. This information is then used to evaluate visitors' use of the website and to compile statistical reports on website activity for Stafford Borough Council.
Stafford Borough Council will not use the statistical analytics tool to track or to collect any personally identifiable information of visitors to our site.