Privacy Policy
What is Personal Data?
Personal data; is defined as information about a living individual that allows them to be identified, for example a name, photographs, videos, telephone number or address. Identification can be from the data itself or through combination with other information (e.g. an anonymised list of employee ID numbers is classed as personal data if there is a further list that links these numbers to names). The processing of personal data is governed by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018.
This Privacy Notice is provided to you by Yarm Town Council, who is the data controller for your data.
How we use Personal Data
We use personal data for some or all of the following purposes:
- To deliver public services to you, including an understanding of your needs to provide the services requested and to understand what we can do for you/inform you of other relevant services
- To confirm your identity to provide some services
- To contact you by post, email, telephone or using social media
- To help us to build up a picture of how we are performing
- To prevent and detect fraud and corruption in the use of public funds and where necessary for the law enforcement functions
- To enable us to meet all legal and statutory obligations and powers including any delegated functions
- To promote the interests of Yarm Town Council
- To maintain our own accounts and records
- To seek your views, opinions or comments
- To notify you of changes to our facilities, services, events and staff, councillors and other role holders
- To send you communications which you have requested and that may be of interest to you; these may include information about campaigns, appeals, other new projects or initiatives
- To process relevant financial transactions including grants and payments for goods and services supplied to Yarm Town Council
Our processing may also include the use of CCTV systems for the prevention and prosecution of crime.
Yarm Town Council is a public authority and has certain powers and obligations. Most of your personal data is processed to ensure compliance with a legal obligation which includes the discharge of our statutory functions and powers. We may also process personal data if it is necessary for the performance of a contract with you, or to take steps to enter into a contract. An example of this would be the acceptance of an allotment garden tenancy.
Sometimes the use of your personal data requires your approval; where this is the case, we may ask for your written consent. Where this is sought we will provide you with full details of the personal data that we would like and the reasons that we need it.
Processing Personal Data
We process some or all of the following personal data if it is necessary to perform tasks and deliver our obligations:
- Names, titles and aliases
- Photographs
- Contact details e.g. telephone numbers, addresses and email addresses
In addition, and only where relevant to the services we provide, we may process information such as gender, age, marital status, nationality, education/work history, academic/professional qualifications, hobbies, family composition and details of any dependants.
Where you pay for activities, or if you supply services to Yarm Town Council, we may process financial identifiers such as bank account numbers, payment card numbers and other payment/transaction identifiers.
The personal data we process may include sensitive or other special categories of personal data such as criminal convictions, racial or ethnic origin, mental and physical health, details of injuries, medication/treatment received, political beliefs, trade union affiliation, genetic data, biometric data, data concerning and sexual life or orientation. The processing of special category data will only be done where relevant and if we have a legitimate interestor legal obligation to carry out this form of processing.
Sharing Personal Data
We work with other data controllers to deliver services to our residents – these include (but are not limited to):
- Local authorities (e.g. Stockton-on-Tees Borough Council)
- Community groups
- Charities
- Other not for profit entities
- Contractors
We may need to share personal data with them so they can carry out their responsibilities to Yarm Town Council. If we are processing personal data jointly for the same purposes we may be joint data controllersand collectively responsible to you for your data. Where we process personal data for our own independent purposes, both Yarm Town Council and the organisation we have shared personal data with will be independently responsible to you.
Data Protection Principles
Yarm Town Council will comply fully with the principles of data protection; the personal data we hold about you will be:
- Used lawfully, fairly and in a transparent way
- Collected only for valid purposes that we have clearly explained to you and not used in any way incompatible with these purposes
- Relevant to the purposes we have told you about and limited to these purposes
- Accurate and kept up to date
- Kept only as long as necessary for the purposes outlined to you
- Kept and destroyed securely, ensuring appropriate technical and security measures are in place to protect your personal data and prevent loss, misuse, unauthorised access and disclosure.
Keeping Personal Data
We will keep some records permanently if we are legally required to do so. We may keep some other records for an extended period of time. For example, it is currently best practice to keep financial records for a minimum period of 8 years to support HMRC audits or provide tax information.
We may have legal obligations to retain some data in connection with our statutory obligations as a public authority.
In general, we endeavour to keep data only for as long as we need it; this means we will delete it when it is no longer needed.
Your Rights
You have a number of rights in respect of your personal data (please note when exercising any of these we may need to verify your identity for security purposes):
- Right to Access: At any point you can contact us to request the personal data we hold on you, including details on why we have it, who has access and where it was obtained.Once we have received your Data Subject Access Request (DSAR) we will respond within one month. There are no fees or charges for the first request but additional requests for the same personal data or requests which are manifestly unfounded or excessive may be subject to an administrative fee.
- Right to Rectification: If the data we hold on you is out of date, incomplete or incorrect, you can inform us and your data will be updated.
- Right to Erasure: If you feel that we should no longer be using your personal data or that we are unlawfully using it, you can request that we erase the personal data we hold.When we receive your request we will confirm whether the personal data has been deleted or the reason why it cannot be deleted (for example because we need it for to comply with a legal obligation).
- Right to Object: You have the right to request that we stop processing your personal data or ask us to restrict processing. Upon receiving the request we will contact you and let you know if we are able to comply or if we have a legal obligation to continue to process your data.
- Right to Portability: You have the right to request that we transfer some of your data to another controller. We will comply with your request, where it is feasible to do so, within one month of receiving your request.
- Right to Withdraw Consent: If we are processing your data following your consent, you can withdraw this easily by email (townclerk@yarmtc.org)
- Right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office: You can contact the Information Commissioners Office on 0303 123 1113, online at org.uk/global/contact-us/email/or post to Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire SK9 5AF
Transferring Personal Data outside of the European Economic Area (EEA)
Any personal data transferred outside of the EEA will only be placed on systems complying with measures giving equivalent protection of personal rights either through international agreements or contracts approved by the European Union. Our website is also accessible from overseas so on occasion some personal data (for example in a newsletter) may be accessed from overseas.
Further Processing
If we wish to use your personal data for a new purpose, not covered by this Privacy Notice, we will provide you with a revised notice explaining this new use prior to commencing the processing, setting out the relevant purposes and processing conditions. Where necessary, we will seek your prior consent to the new processing.
Changes to this Privacy Notice
We keep this Privacy Notice under regular review and we will place any updates on www.yarmtc.org. This Notice was last updated in July 2019.
Get in Touch
Please contact us if you have any questions about this Privacy Notice, the personal data we hold for you or to exercise your rights, queries or complaints:
Yarm Town Council
Town Hall
High Street
Yarm
TS15 9AH