Adult Social Care - Privacy Notice

The provision of adult social care services uses personal data in several ways depending on the level of care / support being provided to you. We will also collect information about you if you are a carer so that we can provide support to you. For some services only limited personal data will be processed. The information we collect is detailed below: -

Personal information such as, your name, contact details (address, email address and telephone number), date of birth, nationality, gender, financial details, employment details, care services provided, housing needs, individuals who support you / you support, National Insurance Number, NHS Number.

Special category data such as your ethnicity, information about your physical and mental health. We may also process information about your religious and philosophical beliefs, sex life or sexual orientation.

We collect your information from you directly (e.g. by asking you to complete one of our forms, via the telephone through our contact centre or face-to-face). We may also obtain your information from other sources such as: -

• your family members, carers or other persons acting on your behalf
• internal Council Departments
• NHS Trusts
• health service providers, such as GPs and hospitals
• care providers and support networks
• care agencies
• other councils
• housing providers
• Care Quality Commission (CQC)
• Councillors and MPs 
• Department for Work and Pensions (DWP)
• Doncaster Safeguarding Adult Board
• partner agencies, such as voluntary organisations and other statutory organisations (police, etc.)

Your information might be used to: -

• provide you with advice and guidance on the services offered by adult social care, health care providers and community-based services as appropriate
• fully understand your needs
• identify services and/or support
• understand your previous health and care support
• carry out an assessment of your needs
• delivery of services or commissioning of services to be carried out on behalf of the Council
• sign post you to services available to you
• request and arrange installation of specialist equipment for you
• arrange short/long term care solutions
• create a secure and comprehensive record of all the work that we do with and for you
• promote your health and wellbeing in partnership with other agencies i.e., Health services
• liaise with agencies, companies, and charities on your behalf
• assess your financial contribution to your care
• work with you or your representative to create a Protection / Safety Plan
• endeavour to keep you safe from harm and investigate safeguarding concerns
• process complaints and compliments regarding the services we have provided
• enable the regulator to carry out inspections and peer reviews, and also investigations which they are legally required to conduct
• analyse the service that we are providing
• comply with our legal obligation to submit mandatory returns to NHS Digital/NHS England, to allow them to assist us with our statutory functions of monitoring, developing more effective prevention strategies, designing, and implementing new payment models and for local strategic planning and commissioning purposes

When we collect your personal data, we rely on the following legal bases:-

• processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller
• processing is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation to which the controller is subject
• processing is necessary in order to protect the vital interests of the data subject or of another natural person

When we collect your ‘special categories of personal data’, (such as health, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation) we rely on the following legal bases:-

• processing is necessary to protect the vital interests of the data subject or of another natural person where the data subject is physically or legally incapable of giving consent
• processing is necessary for reasons of substantial public interest
• processing is necessary for the provision of health or social care or treatment or the management of health or social care systems and services

The Council can rely on the legal bases above under various UK laws these include but, are not limited to:-

• The Care Act 2014
• The Health and Social Care Act 2012
• The Health and Social Care (Quality and Safety) Act 2015
• The Mental Capacity Act 2005
• Mental Health Act 1983 & 2007
• Local Safeguarding Children & Adult Boards Regulations 2006 (SI 2006/90)
• The Localism Act 2011
• The Crime and Disorder Act 1998
• Human Rights Act 1998
• Equalities Act 2010

Health and Social care services will often ask for your consent to engage with them however, this may not be the legal basis they are relying on to process your information.  If the Council is relying on your consent to process your data this will be explained separately along with the right to withdraw consent at any time.

The Council will collect and use your personal information in order to provide Adult Social Care services effectively and to meet our statutory duties under the Care Act 2014, and other relevant legislation. Sometimes some of the information held needs to be shared with staff working in other Council departments, and with the NHS, Police and other agencies or organisations working on our behalf. This is to ensure that you receive appropriate care, support and treatment. Sharing this information also helps to avoid you being asked for the same information more than once.

In order to be able to better commission the services we provide to you, we share adult social care information with the South Yorkshire Integrated Care System. Joining this information with NHS data will allow us to provide better quality services. You cannot be identified from this sharing.

Under the direction known as the Collection of Client-Level Adult Social Care Data (No.2) we will share certain identifiable information with NHS England/NHS Digital.  This sharing assists us to fulfil our statutory functions under Part 1 of the Care Act 2014, and is required in exercise of the powers conferred by section 259(1)(a) of the Health and Social Care Act 2012.

Your information may also be shared with organisations such as the emergency services, NHS, and others for the purpose of enabling the council to prepare for, respond and recover from emergencies that may affect the area (such as flooding). This is in line with the council’s responsibilities under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004. Wherever possible we will discuss with you the reasons for sharing information and listen to your views. When sharing information we do so in line with the Data Protection Act and agreed information sharing protocols. We will not share your information without a legal basis to do so.

There are some circumstances where we may share information without needing to discuss this with you, including where:-

• we believe there is a risk of serious harm to you or someone else
• we are required to share information by law
• we are required to by the Courts
• the Police need information in relation to a criminal investigation

Information may need to be shared with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) to enable them to carry out their role as the regulator of health and social care in England.  This could include carrying out inspections and peer reviews, and investigations which they are legally required to conduct.  For inspections, in most circumstances we will endeavour to only provide anonymised information however, in rare circumstances copies of a person’s record may be required.  You can read their privacy notice here: CQC Privacy Notice. 

As noted above, to provide you with services and support it is likely that we will need to share some of your information with one or more of the following:

• our providers, such as care providers and equipment providers
• commissioned service providers
• other charitable and voluntary sector partners
• health service providers, including NHS agencies (e.g. GPs, hospitals, ambulance, health visitor, mental health services)
• Doncaster Safeguarding Adult Board
• Cabinet Office for the National Fraud Initiative (NFI). You can find more information about the NFI at: http://www.doncaster.gov.uk/services/the-council-democracy/the-national-fraud-initiative-and-data-matching
• South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue
• Workforce Development Team
• the Police
• Legal Services
• advocacy services
• Direct Payment support services
• Direct payment pre-payment card providers
• supported lodging or semi-independent accommodation providers
• Locality Hubs
• Government departments and agencies
• other local authorities

Other individuals and organisations working with you so that everyone understands your needs and circumstances

We will keep your information for different periods of time, depending on what we are using it for. We only keep your information for as long as we need to, after which the data will be securely deleted. Some personal data may be retained for archiving purposes in line with Article 89 of General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR).

Your information will be kept in line with our Retention Schedule which can be found on this page of our website.

The law gives you specific rights over your information. These rights are:-

• to be informed of our use of information about you
• of access to information about you
• rectify information about you that is inaccurate
• to have your information erased (the ‘right to be forgotten’)
• to restrict how we use information about you
• to move your information to a new service provider
• to object to how we use information about you
• not to have decisions made about you on the basis of automated decision making
• to object to direct marketing
• to complain about anything the Council does with your information (please see the ‘Complaints’ section below)

Some of the rights listed above apply only in certain situations, and some have a limited effect. Your rights are explained further in the Individuals’ Rights Procedure on our website, as is how to make a request under one or more of them. You can request information about yourself by making a subject access request on this page of the Council’s website.

This notice is kept under regular review to make sure it is up to date and accurate.

The Council is required by law to have a DPO. The DPO has a number of duties, including:

• monitoring the Council’s compliance with data protection law;
• providing expert advice and guidance on data protection;
• acting as the point of contact for data subjects; and,
• co-operating and consulting with the Information Commissioner’s Office (see ‘Complaints’ below).

The Council’s Data Protection Officer can be contacted by email at information.governance@doncaster.gov.uk 

If you are unhappy with the way in which your information has been handled you should contact the Council’s Data Protection Officer so that we can try and put things right. Alternatively, and if we have been unable to resolve your complaint, you can also refer the matter to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). The ICO is the UK's independent body set up to uphold information rights, and they can investigate and adjudicate on any data protection related concerns you raise with them.

They can be contacted via the methods below:

Website: www.ico.org.uk

Telephone: 0303 123 1113

Post: Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF