Fair processing notices - Violent or abusive behaviour

Stoke-on-Trent City Council is the data controller for any personal information we hold about you in relation to your tenancy, which may include any information relating to incidents of violence or abusive behaviour affecting the health and safety of individuals. In order to comply with data protection legislation, we must be sure you understand how we use this information.

We use your personal data to meet our obligations under housing legislation.  We are allowed to do so under data protection law because it is part of or public task.  Article 6(1)(e) of the GDPR allows this.  We also have obligations under Health and Safety legislation which requires us to work in a way that keeps our employees and others safe.  As this is a legal obligation we are allowed to process personal data to meet it under Article 6(1)(c) of the GDPR.

The tenancy agreement is a contract and we will process your data to manage your tenancy under that contract.  Article 6(1)(b) of the GDPR allows data to be processed when it is necessary for the performance of a contract.

When a staff member feels they have been subjected to any form of violence or abuse, or are made to feel at risk, we may decide to put a “person caution alert code” against an individual’s name on the electronic housing management system, in order to protect staff members. If an alert is added to your name we will write and tell you the reason why.

We may share this information with staff members and external agencies who are delivering services on behalf of Housing Services.

External agencies that we may share your information with, but this is not an exhaustive list, include:

• Unitas in relation to property management and maintenance 
• Citizen’s Advice Bureau (CAB) and Potteries Moneywise for financial support services
• Social Care, family intervention, and wellbeing teams
• CAMHS, mental health access team, Disability Solutions, Age UK 
• Louis Taylor estate agents in respect to valuation of your council property as part of the right-to-buy process
• The district valuer in respect to valuation of your council property as part of the right to buy process
• Police in relation to the Crime and Disorder Act 1998, Anti-Social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014 and the Localism Act 2011
• Project Management (Staffordshire) Limited (PM Training) in relation to Homeworks or Tidy Garden Schemes
• other agencies, organisations including those with charitable status, where appropriate, in relation to the delivery of housing-related services
• Staffordshire Fire and Rescue in relation to Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005
• Community Energy Scheme Provider in relation to solar panels.

If a request to share the information is made from other council teams, we may also share the information with them to protect their team members.

The information will only be shared with other teams and agencies that have a need to know.

How long we keep the “person caution alert” on the housing management system will depend on the severity of the incident. The information recorded will be reviewed at either 6 months, 12 months or 2 years after the incident occurred. We will write to inform you if the alert remains on the system after the review date.

If you have been informed of a “person caution alert” and you are not happy with the information we hold, in the first instance, you should contact the team dealing with your information, refer to the letter sent for contact details.

If you are still unhappy, you can make a formal complaint to the Customer Feedback Team, Floor two, Civic Centre, Glebe Street, Stoke-on-Trent, ST4 1HH or email customer.feedback@stoke.gov.uk.

If you wish to complain about how your personal information has been handled by Stoke-on-Trent City Council, please contact the Information Rights Team, email foi@stoke.gov.uk or write to Information Rights Team, Floor 2, Civic Centre, Glebe Street, Stoke-on-Trent ST4 1HH.

If you are still not satisfied you can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office at: The Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF, Tel: 0303 123 1113 or you can visit their website at ico.org.uk.