Privacy Notice - Troubled Families
Privacy Notice
Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council supports the Government’s ‘Troubled Families’ initiative for families with complex needs. This aims to support families and will encourage them to play a stable role in their own communities.
The Council will be identifying those families with the most pressing and complex needs. This will involve some sharing of information between Council departments and with other organisations (such as housing, health, education, employment, and criminal justice partners). Any such sharing will be done proportionately and lawfully for the purpose of identifying those families who meet the initiative’s criteria and most need this support. It will be done to ensure that services are better coordinated and focused for those families.
In order to identify families and understand the difference we are making, we will be sharing personal records that relate to you. This might include (but not limited to) records relating to social care, involvement with the police, courts and probation, aspects relating to your employment, anti-social behaviour, violence in the home, alcohol and substance misuse, educational attendance and behaviour, vulnerable children and health issues.
This information sharing will not affect family benefits, services or treatments received.
The personal data of individuals and families provided to the Department of Communities and Local Government will be linked with information from other organisations such as the NHS (including Public Health England), the Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC), Department of Communities and Local Government, Department of Work and Pensions, West Midlands Police, the Ministry of Justice, the Probation Services, Schools and the Youth Offending Team. The data includes both those families eligible but yet to be worked with and those who have been worked with as part of the programme.
The data is also being shared with the Office of National Statistics (ONS) who have been commissioned by the DCLG to carry out research on the impact of the Troubled Families Programme.
No individuals will be identifiable in any published research information.
All data will be transferred, handled and stored in accordance with the Data Protection Act 1998. Legally binding agreements are in place between Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council, the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG), and the research organisation (ONS), and agreements are in place between Government Departments, to ensure that all parties comply with the strict rules on handling, transferring, storing and destroying the data under the Data Protection Act 1998.
Prior to sharing information for Government evaluation and research, data agreements will be in place to ensure that:
- The data can only be used for carrying out research
- The linked information is anonymised prior to being shared with the Department for Communities and Local Government
- It will be impossible for any person or family to be identified from any published reports
- The linked personal information will not be shared with or made available to the local authority or any other public agency
- All information is transferred, handled and stored in accordance with the Data Protection Act 1998
- Appropriate measures are in place to prevent unauthorised use of information
- The information is securely destroyed after seven years from the point it ceases to be active (e.g. seven years after the service ends)
For further information on the FACTs initiative at this authority, contact:
ISM Team
Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council
Email: Ecaf_queries@sandwell.gov.uk
Tel: 0845 352 7743