Privacy notice for Family Focus Project (Kingston and Richmond)

Introduction

This privacy notice informs you about how the Family Focus Project in Kingston and Richmond processes your personal information. 

Achieving for Children is registered as a controller with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) (registration number ZA045069).

The Family Focus Project aims to seek the views of parents, carers and families who have children that live in the Royal Borough of Kingston or the London Borough of Richmond, particularly those who have had experience of children’s services, including family hubs, early help and social services. 

We want to hear from parents and carers about their experience of seeking or receiving help, and what has or hasn't worked for them. 

We also want to create opportunities for parents and carers to input directly into new strategies or services by sharing their views and experiences. This includes seeking views about our early help strategy, the information we provide to families, the services we offer in our family hubs, as well as the way we deliver our early help and social services.

Personal and special category data we collect

If you have an interest in participating in a focus group or forum, we will collect the following information about you: 

• full name
• phone number
• email address

If you attend a focus group or forum, we will ask you to provide us with the following information: 

• name
• borough of residence
• age group
• gender
• ethnicity
• email address (if you wish to be contacted)

If you engage in the forums or groups and would like some additional advice or support, then, with your consent, we may gather the following information to support appropriate referrals or sign posting: 

• reason for wanting additional advice or support
• relevant information about your personal situation

How we use your personal data

We use the information we collect about you to: 

• Contact you about upcoming forums and focus groups.
• Monitor the engagement of parents and carers. 
• Ensure that we have engaged parents and carers from diverse backgrounds.
• Report anonymously on the engagement of parents and carers in the project to strategic boards.

Legal basis for processing your personal data

The legal basis we rely on for processing your personal data is:

• consent
• processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest

It is in the public interest to seek the views of parents and carers who use our services to ensure that they are meeting the needs of children, parents, and families. 

These legal basis are underpinned by acts of legislation that dictate what actions can and should be taken by local authorities, including:

• Children’s Act 1989
• Children’s Act 2004
• Human Rights Act 1998
• Equalities Act 2010
• Statutory guidance: Working Together to Safeguard Children 2023 

How long your personal data will be kept

• Your name and contact details will be kept until the conclusion of the project.
• You can ask to have your name and contact details removed if you no longer wish to be contacted about forums or groups.

Keeping your information secure

We record your information using Google Forms and these are kept on a secure Google Drive that is restricted to the project lead and those directly involved in the project. 

We have appropriate security measures in place to prevent personal information from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way. We limit access to your personal information to those who have a genuine business need to know it. Those processing your information will do so only in an authorised manner and are subject to a duty of confidentiality.

Achieving for Children’s email service has been configured to the Government Digital Service, and we encrypt and authenticate email in transit using Transport Layer Security (TLS) and Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting and Conformance (DMARC). We will ensure that when we send emails containing your personal information, they are sent using appropriate security measures to encrypt the data in transit. This may involve the use of a third party encryption tool where appropriate.

We also have procedures in place to deal with any suspected data security breach. We will notify you and any applicable regulator of a suspected data security breach where we are legally required to do so.

Who we share your personal information with

We will only share your personal information with your consent if you wish to be supported with a referral or signposted to a service. 

We will share anonymised data about the engagement in the project with our strategic boards and partnerships but this will not identify any individual. 

Your rights and access to information 

Under data protection legislation, you have the right to request access to the information that we hold about you. To request a copy of your data, please read the Individual Rights Requests page on this website and then submit your request using your preferred method of contact. 

You also have the right to:

• object to the processing of personal data that is likely to cause, or is causing, damage or distress
• have inaccurate personal data rectified, blocked, erased or destroyed
• prevent processing for the purpose of direct marketing
• object to decisions being taken by automated means
• in certain circumstances, have inaccurate personal data rectified, blocked, erased or destroyed; and 
• a right to seek redress, either through the ICO, or through the courts

If you have any questions or concerns about the way we process personal data, or would like to discuss anything in this privacy notice, please contact our Data Protection Officer: [email protected].

If you want to make a complaint about how we handle your personal data, we ask that you give our Data Protection Officer the opportunity to respond in the first instance, but you are not obliged to do this. You can make a complaint directly to the Information Commissioner’s Office.