Adoption privacy notice

Who is the Data Controller for this processing?

We are the Data Controller for this processing.

The personal information we have collected from you will be shared with fraud prevention agencies who will use it to prevent fraud and money-laundering and to verify your identity. If fraud is detected, you could be refused certain services, finance, or employment.

What services are covered by this privacy notice?

Cheshire West and Chester Council Adoptions – Together for Adoption

Recruits and assesses prospective adoptive parents for our children across the borough and provides support to the adopted children, their adoptive parents and their birth families.

What personal information do we hold?

We only collect and use the minimum amount of personal information required when delivering a service to you. Wherever possible we use non-identifiable personal information.

The service may use some or all of the personal information below:

• information about you, this could include your name, address, date of birth
• visual images, personal appearance and behaviour
• national identifiers such as NHS number, National Insurance number etc.
• information about your family
• details about your lifestyle and social circumstances
• financial details
• employment and education details
• the IP address that you accessed any of our online services from
• case file information
• criminal proceedings, outcomes and sentences
• physical or mental health details
• racial or ethnic origin
• offences (including alleged offences)
• religious or other beliefs of a similar nature
• Social Care support outcomes
• advocacy details

We get most of this information from you, but we may also get some of this data from:

• central Government agencies
• other local authorities
• health and social care providers
• police and probation services
• members of the public (referrer)
• commissioned partners
• family members

How do we use your personal information?

We use your information to:

• safeguard children
• plan and improve the services we offer
• detect and prevent crime or fraud
• research, however this would be in anonymised form unless we ask for your consent to use your personal information for this purpose
• evidence positive outcomes to central government funding agencies
• manage and support you as an adopter
• enable us to contact someone for you in case of an emergency

Who else might we share your personal information with?

Sometimes we may need to share your information, but we will only do so where it is necessary or required by law. We will only share the minimum information for each circumstance.

We may sometimes need to share some of your information with:

• health service providers including NHS agencies (GPs, hospitals, ambulance, health visitor, mental health services)
• education providers
• care providers, e.g. day care, domiciliary, residential
• Government agencies (e.g. Department of Health, Department of Work and Pensions)
• support groups for people with disabilities
• local government
• police
• substance misuse agencies
• advocacy services
• employers
• fostering and adoption agencies and providers

Adoption and Special Guardianship Leadership Board (ASGLB) data is shared with Ofstead on a quarterly basis. The ASGLB data return is completed by every local authority, regional adoption agency and voluntary adoption agency in England.

In addition, if you are receiving support from Children’s Social Care then the NHS may share your NHS number with us. This is so that the NHS and Children’s Social Care are using the same number to identify you whilst providing your care.

By using the same number the NHS and Children’s Social Care can work together more closely to support you.

We will use the NHS Number in an integrated care record system across a number of support services including GP’s, hospitals, community matrons, district nurses and social care practitioners. You can find out more about the Cheshire Care Record.

We may also use Data Processors to support these activities, for example by providing the systems we need to or delivering services on our behalf.

What is the legal basis for our use of your personal information?

Most of the personal information we process is provided to us directly by you, under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the lawful bases we rely on for using your personal information are:

• we have a legal obligation (GDPR Article 6 (c)
• we need to protect your vital interests (GDPR Article 6 (d)
• we need it to perform a public task (GDPR Article 6 (e)

When we collect data about your race, health (including biometric or genetic data), sex life, sexual orientation, ethnic origin, politics or trade union membership, we also rely on the following lawful basis:

• we need it for employment, social security or social protection (GDPR Article 9 (2) (b))
• we need to protect your vital interests in situations where you are incapable for giving consent (GDPR Article 9 (2) (c)
• we need to defend a legal claim (GDPR Article 9 (2) (f)
• we need to collect it for Substantial Public Interest in order to comply with UK legislation (GDPR Article 9 (2) (g)
• we are providing you with health and social care support (GDPR Article 9 (2) (h))
• we need to analyse your information (GDPR Article 9 (2) (j))

The legislation we rely on when using your personal information to meet our legal obligations or public tasks includes but is not limited to:

• Children and Families Act 2014
• Care Act
• The Adoption and Children Act 2002 and associated regulations
• The Children and Adoption Act 2006 and associated regulations
• The Local Authority Social Services Act 1970

Where will we store your information?

Your information will be securely stored within our offices and on our network.

How long will we keep your personal information?

We will only use your personal information whilst delivering the service to you and to deal with any questions or complaints that we may receive about this, unless the law requires us to keep it for a longer period. In practice, this means that your information will be kept for 100 years then securely deleted.

If we need to use your information for research or reports, your information will be anonymised and any information taken from notes (hand written or typed) during any consultation sessions will be securely destroyed. The information will continue to be used in a summarised and anonymised form in any research reports or papers that are published. The anonymised information in the papers may be of historic interest and may be held in public archives indefinitely.

Your rights

Under data protection law, you have rights including:

• your right of access - you have the right to ask us for copies of your personal information.
• your right to rectification - you have the right to ask us to rectify information you think is inaccurate. You also have the right to ask us to complete information you think is incomplete.
• your right to restriction of processing - you have the right to ask us to restrict the processing of your information in certain circumstances.
• your right to object to processing - you have the right to object to the processing of your personal data in certain circumstances.

You are not required to pay any charge for exercising your rights. If you make a request, we have one month to respond to you.

To make a request follow the instructions on our Data protection for you page.

How to complain if you are unhappy about how your data is used

You can complain directly to the our Data Protection team online or by post.

• By post: Data Protection Officer, The Portal, Wellington Road, Ellesmere Port, CH65 0BA

You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office:

• By post: The Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF
• Telephone: 0303 123 1113

Will my personal information be accessible outside the UK?

Your information is stored within the UK, but the transfer of personal information outside of the UK could become necessary.

This would only take place if permitted by law, where there are appropriate safeguards in place to protect the personal information.