Privacy Policy: Parents in a fostering placement

Privacy Notice for parents in a fostering placement

Introduction

This privacy notice is being provided to you because you are in placement with Olive Branch Fostering foster carer. As we hold information about you, the law requires us to give you this privacy notice. The law, Article 9 of the UK General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) allows us to hold your personal information as it is ’required for the management of social care systems and services'.

A privacy notice sets out what sort of information we hold, why we need it, how we hold it, how we use it, with whom we share it with and what rights you have in relation to this information. This privacy notice is also available on our website www.olivebranchfostering.co.uk

We are required to have a Data Protection Officer (DPO) who is responsible for making sure that our fostering service complies with its legal duties about collecting, keeping and sharing personal data.

Our DPO is Joanne Sharples and they can be contacted at joanne@olivebranchfostering.co.uk

Why do we collect your personal data?

When you live with our foster carer, they are asked to keep records about how you are getting on, what is going well and what is not going so well.  Your foster carer is helped to do that by one of our employees. This person may also write down things when they visit you and the foster carer. The law says we must keep information about you and share this information with your/your child’s social worker.

What personal information do we collect?

We hold personal information on you which your local authority Social Care Service has given us, both before you live with our foster carer and during your time with them. This can include basic personal information such as your name, date of birth, address and telephone number. Social Care will also give us information on the immediate circumstances which led to you and your child coming to live with foster carers, so our foster carer and employees can help understand and support you as much as possible. This may also include information about your health. The information given to us by Social Care is kept to a minimum of what we need to know and is to make sure the foster placement can meet the needs of you and your child.

We will also collect information from the foster carer you are living with, or from our employee who visits, of how your time with a foster carer is going and how you are caring for your child.

How do we collect your personal data?

Information is collected through the reports we ask foster carers to write and during our employee visits to you, your child and foster carer. Information is also given to us by Social Care and meetings which we might attend.

How do we use your personal data?

All information is treated confidentially and held safely on our secure database. We give regular updates to your / your child’s social worker about how your and your child’s time with the foster carer is going, and this means sharing some of this information over the telephone, through secure email or written reports.

Who has access to your data?

Employees of our fostering service will have access to your information for the lawful purposes set out above. Additionally, your information may be shared with third parties in certain situations, such as with our secure database provider, with Ofsted when it inspects our fostering service as required by law.  It will also be shared with your child’s social worker from the local authority.  We may also make information available to regulatory authorities, governmental organisations, or other third parties in order to comply with the law.

How do we make sure your personal data is kept safe?

We have a range of policies and controls in place to try to ensure that your data is not lost, accidentally destroyed, misused or disclosed. We have a system to ensure that your information is accessed only by individuals authorised by us to do so in the performance of their duties.

How long do we keep your personal data?

Your limited details will be part of your child’s record. These records will be kept for different amounts of time depending on whether your child was referred to us but not placed with foster carers (12 months) or if they were referred and then placed with our foster carers (75 years).

How can you see what personal information is held on your record?

You can ask to see what personal information we hold about you. This is sometimes called a Subject Access Request. We will provide this information to you within one month (unless things are very complicated), and there is no cost for this. If you want to see the information we hold about you, please contact the DPO/Registered Manager Joanne Sharples at:

Suite 29 Hardmans Business Centre  
New Hall Hey Road  
Rossendale  
BB4 6HR

Tel: 01706 558910
E-Mail: joanne@olivebranchfostering.co.uk

You do not have to give any reasons for why you want to see this information.

Your data protection rights

Under data protection law, you have rights to your information.  These vary according to the basis on which personal data is processed. Your rights to your data are:

• 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 personal 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 personal information 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.

Comments or concerns

If you have any comments or concerns about how we use your information, we would like to hear from you. Please contact the data controller whose details are provided earlier in this notice.