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Privacy notice - Psychology Service

Who are we and what do we do?

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Middlesbrough Council has a Psychology Service that provides teachers and education professionals with a range of services to help them to support children or young people and meet their educational needs.

What type of personal data do we collect and how do we collect it?

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We collect ‘personal data’ directly from children and young people, their parents and carers. We also collect data from professionals, schools, academies, training providers, other Council services, and other organisations such as health or care services.

The personal data we normally collect includes names and contact details, date of birth, academic attainment or details about development, progress, and school attendance, primary and additional languages, and information about what additional help and support has already been provided.

We also collect ‘special category data’ including details of physical, emotional and social development, health needs, special educational needs, including details of any medical diagnosis, religious and philosophical beliefs, sexual orientation, and race or ethnic origin.

How the Law allows us to use your personal data

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We use and share personal data to help us with our ‘legal obligations’ and to complete our ‘public tasks’. We use special category data to provide ‘health or social care or treatment’. Some of the laws that support our work include the Education Act 2002, Education Act 2011, Children and Families Act 2014, and the Special Educational Needs and Disability Code of Practice: 0 to 25 years.

We also provide a traded service to schools, academies, colleges, and other education settings to help them to meet their legal obligations. We will ask for your ‘consent’ when we use or share your personal data for this part of our service – unless the law requires us to do so.

What is your personal data used for?

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We use personal data for education, health, and care needs assessments which the law requires the Council to complete. These assessments help us to identify and consider any special educational needs, and to provide advice for an Education, Health, and Care Plan, where appropriate.  We also use personal data to check the quality of our services and improve how we work.

When providing our services to professionals, schools, academies, colleges, and other education setting, we collect and process information to help identify approaches, equipment, programmes, or other support to help a child or young person to make progress in their learning and development, and to circulate professional guidance and information.

Will your personal data be shared?

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We share information with the schools, academies, colleges, and other education settings that the child or young person attends or is transferring to during their education and development. We also share personal data with other services at Middlesbrough Council such as Education Services, Children’s Social Care, and Adult Social Care, other health and care organisations, and other local authorities who are involved in your care and support or in keeping you safe.

Sometimes we are required to share personal data with Government bodies or regulators such as Ofsted or the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman and the Courts and Tribunals.

How do we keep your personal data secure?

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We use the following measures to ensure that your personal data is secure: data protection and security policies, information security incident reporting, data and device encryption, system and data access controls, user accounts and passwords, physical and environmental security, staff vetting practices, staff training and awareness, data back-ups, ICT network penetration testing, and business continuity and disaster recovery plans. Any data that we send or receive to other organisations is encrypted and protected.

How long will we keep your personal data?

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We will hold your data for 35 years after we have finished working with you. For children in care, data is held for 75 years from their date of birth.

Is your personal data processed overseas?

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We do not transfer your personal data overseas.

Marketing

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We do not use personal data for direct marketing purposes for our statutory services. Where professionals provide non-work contact details, we will circulate professional guidance and information, which you can unsubscribe from at any time.

What are your information rights?

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Your Information Rights are set out in law and, subject to some exceptions, you have the:

  • Right to rectification - to ask for information to be corrected
  • Right to erasure - to have your personal data deleted
  • Right to object - to how your data is used
  • Right to restriction - to request limits on how your data is used
  • Right to portability - to request that we move your data to another organisation
  • Right of subject access - to request a copy of data the Council holds about you

Making a complaint

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If you have any concerns about the way we are collecting or using your personal data, you should raise your concern with us in the first instance or directly to the Information Commissioner's Office. Visit the website of the Information Commissioner's Office.

Contact

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If you would like to discuss anything in this privacy notice or your information rights, please contact:

The Data Protection Officer
Middlesbrough Council
PO Box 500, Middlesbrough, TS1 9FT
Phone: 01642 245432
Email: dataprotection@middlesbrough.gov.uk