The Data Protection Act gives rights to individuals about whom personal information is recorded (data subjects).
Do you know what personal information Hastings Borough Council ('the Council') holds about you and for what purposes it is used?
On this page we explain your rights to see your personal information and to be provided with information about the uses to which it is put.
The Council keeps personal information about you in order that:
The information about you is also used to maintain a record of any help provided (e.g. housing advice) in order that we can look at it from time to time to see if it is still what you need and to plan for any changes.
The personal information you provide may also be shared with other agencies involved in the provision of services to you and between departments of the Council where we are legally required to do so.
Depending on the original purpose for which it was obtained and the use to which it is to be put information may be shared with a variety of services.
Examples include Housing Benefits sharing with the DSS. Information may also be shared, where necessary, with other organisations that provide services on our behalf e.g. providers of residential accommodation, providers of voluntary care and contractors for housing maintenance.
In all of these examples, the information provided is only the minimum necessary to enable them to provide services to you.
Personal information about you may also be provided to Government departments, where we are required to do so by law, or other local authorities.
An example would be when you have moved from one local authority to another and the new authority requires confirmation of the services you were receiving.
We may also choose or be required to share personal information for the purpose of Fraud Prevention and Detection
Information about you may also be provided for statistical research. This will not include your name and address unless you have given us permission to provide that information.
The personal information held will depend on the service being provided. Basic information, that is your name and address, age, date of birth, sex, next of kin; plus a note of the service provided, decisions regarding the provision and any meetings between you and the department of the Council providing the service will appear on all records. Other, more sensitive, data may also be held. Depending on the needs of the service being provided such data may include for example: details of a person's physical or mental health; disabilities and racial or ethnic origin.
Information relating to specific services include the level of payment and the current state of the account (Council Tax), property details and extent of proposed alterations (planning), health and disability information (housing).
The information is kept on secure computer systems and in secure manual filing systems. Maintaining the record and keeping it secure is the responsibility of the department of the Council providing the services you receive. All employees of the Council are required to comply with the Council's security policy.
The Council's employees have a duty of care when providing services. This includes respecting the right to confidentiality and ensuring that information about you is only used and given to others for the purposes of the service being provided. Care is taken to ensure that third parties cannot access the information without permission and that data about you is not disclosed to third parties or others without your consent.
Normally, your records will be kept, after the service provided to you has ceased, only for as long as is required by law. If there is no legal requirement to keep the records they will be destroyed as soon as is practicable. Where there is no legal requirement to retain information it is not normally kept for more than six years.
You should contact the Council's Data Protection Officer, who will provide you with the appropriate Subject Access Request application form. When you fill in the form you will be asked to supply your name and address; details of the service(s) you are receiving; and any other information, which may help the Council find your information. If you have difficulty with the form, we can help you with it.
All of the personal information we hold about you on both our computer and manual record systems. You will also be given a description of the purposes for which we process your data, a list of those to whom we disclose the data and information about sources, where this is available.
You may not see information about other persons, unless they have given their consent. This includes information about members of your family. If you are a parent or a member of an elderly person's family you may be provided with information about your child or the elderly person but only where you have written permission to ask for it or have been granted powers to do so by the court and the Council is satisfied that such permissions are genuine.
You will be provided with a copy for your retention and use. This may be a printout of the information from the computer system or a photocopy of your manually held record. If you have difficulty in understanding any of the contents you may ask us for assistance.
You will be charged £10 for each Subject Access Request you make. This is to cover the costs of searching for and providing a copy of the information.
The Council must respond within 40 days of receiving your application. The 40 days begins from the date on which you have sent in the written application, the fee if needed and any additional information required by the Council in order to identify your information.
You should check it to ensure that you have received all of the information to which you are entitled and to make sure it is correct.
You should tell the Council that the data are incorrect and ask them to correct it. You must do this in writing. The Council must inform you if they have or have not corrected the data within 21 days of receiving your letter. If the Council does not agree that the information is incorrect, you can ask it to record your disagreement on the record itself.
If the Council does not correct the information, you may also appeal to the Information Commissioner or the courts. These organisations have the power to order the Council to correct data that are wrong.
The Data Protection Act 1998 Act defines inaccurate data as being "data which is incorrect or misleading as to any matter of fact".
The Act provides you with a right to apply to the court to have inaccurate data rectified, blocked, erased or destroyed. This right extends to any other personal data that contain an opinion about you based on the inaccurate data.
You can appeal to the Council through its complaints procedure, or to the Information Commissioner whose staff will look into the matter on your behalf.
Yes. In addition to the right of subject access mentioned above, individuals have the following rights:
As far as the first three of these rights are concerned you should write to the Council informing us that you require us to cease or not to begin the processing of personal data about you.
In the case of the first of these you must state the purpose for which the data are being processed and that you consider the processing is already causing or is likely to cause you or another person unwarranted substantial damage or substantial distress.
The second requires you to notify the Council, in writing, that we should cease or not begin the processing of personal data about you for the purpose of direct marketing.
The third is specific to the use of automated decision-making processes. If you do not wish to be the subject of decisions based wholly on such a process you must write to the Council requiring us to ensure no decisions that significantly affect you are based solely on such processing.
If we have not received a notice from you, we will inform you that a decision that significantly affects you has been taken by automatic means. If we do so, and you object, then you can inform us in writing that you require us to reconsider the decision or take a new decision by some other means. The Council has 21 days in which to respond to your letter.
Yes, you must inform us within 21 days of our telling you that we have taken our decision by automated means.
The Act requires us to respond to your notice within 21 days of receiving it. Our reply will tell you whether or not we have complied with your request, intend to comply with your request, or the extent to which we intend to comply. If we do not consider your request is justified our response will list our reasons.
If you do not receive a reply or if you consider the Council has not complied with any of the above notices you have a right to apply to the court for an order requiring us to comply.
If you have suffered damage or distress as a result of the contravention of any of the requirements of the Act by the Council then you may be entitled to compensation.
The court will only support such a claim if you can show that the Council had not taken reasonable care to ensure it complied with the relevant requirement of the Act.
As with the example quoted earlier, only if the court is satisfied that you have suffered damage as a result of the Council's use of the inaccurate data.
You can complain to the Information Commissioner if you consider the Council has breached any of the requirements of the Data Protection Act. These include a breach of any of the data protection principles, processing data without having notified the Commissioner, failing to respond to any of your written notices (see above), processing data without your consent (where consent is necessary), refusing to provide you with the personal information you have requested. This list is not exhaustive.
At your request, the Information Commissioner will carry out an assessment of the Council's processing to establish whether or not we are doing so in compliance with the Act.
Should the Information Commissioner find the Council are not processing in compliance with the Act the Council will be issued with a notice requiring it to take steps to ensure compliance.
If you need help in understanding the contents of this leaflet or the information provided please inform the Council and we will provide someone to explain that information.
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This page last updated: 08/08/2008