Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO) Service Privacy Notice

Information

The Trust has in place its own Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO) service. This notice explains how LADO collect and use personal information in respect of allegations made about people in positions of trust who work or volunteer with children.

Statutory guidance requires the Trust to:

  1. Have designated a particular officer, or team of officers (either as part of local multi-agency arrangements or otherwise), to be involved in the management and oversight of allegations against people in positions of trust who work or volunteer with children.
  2. Put arrangements in place to ensure that any allegations about those who work with children are passed to the designated officer, or team of officers, without delay.

Who are We

Birmingham Children’s Trust (BCT) collects, uses and is responsible for certain personal information about you. When we do so we are regulated under the General Data Protection Regulation which applies across the European Union (including in the United Kingdom) and we are responsible as ‘controller’ of that personal information for the purposes of those laws.

For details of how Birmingham Children’s Trust uses personal information, please visit the Birmingham Children’s Trust website and search for 'data protection'.

What information does the Trust collect?

The Trust's LADO collects information about:

  • People in positions of trust who work or volunteer with children who are brought to the attention of the LADO
  • Children and their families and their personal welfare and safeguarding circumstances
  • Organisations who engage people in positions of trust (e.g. as employees, volunteers or contractors)

The LADO collects personal information about people in positions of trust and children to enable the LADO to fulfil their statutory functions effectively. This may include the following personal and special category information:

  • workers' and volunteer's personal information (such as name, date of birth, address, job/volunteer role and details of the allegation being made against them)
  • employers' personal information (such as email, address, telephone numbers)
  • children's personal information (such as name, date of birth, address and details of any safeguarding concerns), including personal information about the children of people in positions of trust.

Why does the Trust collect personal information?

The Trust collects personal information in connection with people in positions of trust in order to perform its statutory duties in support of children’s safeguarding and welfare as set out in Working Together to Safeguard Children 2018.

How does the Trust use personal information?

The Trust uses personal information to ensure allegations about people in positions of trust are investigated thoroughly and to advise organisations who engage people in positions of trust on actions in order to enable them to safeguard the children who use their services and/or are in their care.

The Trust's LADO will record and pass on personal information and details of allegations about people in positions of trust and children to:

  • persons and bodies in Birmingham who also have a role in ensuring children's safeguarding and welfare, including the Multi-Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH)
  • LADOs in other local authorities to enable them to fulfil their respective statutory duties with regard to people in positions of trust who may work or volunteer with children in another local authority areas
  • employers and organisations who engage people in positions of trust to advise on and discuss potential courses of action to safeguard the children to whom the employer or organisation has a duty of care.

Actions may include, but are not limited to, notification by the employer/organisation to professional organisations such as the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC), the General Teaching Council, the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) and regulatory bodies such as Ofsted, the Charity Commission and the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS).

The LADO may also notify professional organisations and other bodies of allegations and concerns where people in positions of trust are self-employed or where an employer or volunteer organisation has failed to take appropriate action to safeguard children. The LADO may also contact the individual directly where they are self- employed and in a position of trust.

The LADO uses personal information to monitor and oversee the progress and outcomes of any allegations and will use personal information about people in positions of trust who are subject to an allegation and about children in order to hold a LADO meeting with relevant Trust officers, police and other agencies as well as employers and representatives from organisations who engage volunteers where a coordinated and/or collective response is required.

LADO meetings are minuted and minutes from these meetings are stored securely and only shared on a strict need to know basis and where this is lawful.

The LADO will maintain a record of the allegation, actions taken and advised and any outcomes.

How does the LADO keep personal information secure?

The information provided to the LADO is held within a secure storage system to which only authorised Trust staff are allowed access.

The Trust takes its data security responsibilities seriously and has policies and procedures in place to ensure the personal data held is:

  • prevented from being accidentally or deliberately compromised;
  • accessed, altered, disclosed or deleted only by those authorised to do so;
  • accurate and complete in relation to why we are processing it;
  • continually accessible and usable with daily backups; and
  • protected by levels of security appropriate to the risks presented by our processing.

How long do we keep hold of personal information?

Personal information collected by the LADO is subject to the Trust’s records management policies and procedures and will be kept in line with the Trust's records retention schedule.

For e.g.:

  • Allegation results in joint S47 investigation or single agency criminal investigation - Date of referral + 40 years
  • Substantiated allegation - Date of referral + 40 years
  • Risk by Association - Date of referral + 10 years or until the person has reached normal retirement age (65 years) if that is longer
  • All other LADO Contacts - 6 years from date of contact (The Limitation Act 1980)
  • Register of Persons Posing a Risk to Children and those cautioned or convicted of offences against children - 75 years from the date of the caution/conviction

Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA)

To comply with the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) directive 2015, the Trust is required to retain all records that may be relevant to the inquiry until further notice.

The Trust considers personal information concerning allegations about people in positions of trust is likely to be relevant to the IICSA and intends to retain this information in accordance with the notice of retention/non‐destruction of documents relating to the Inquiry.

Your Rights under GDPR

Under GDPR you have rights which you can exercise free of charge which allow you to:

  • know what the Trust is doing with your information and why
  • ask to see what information the Trust hold about you (subject access request)
  • ask us to correct any mistakes in the information we hold about you
  • object to direct marketing
  • make a complaint to the Information Commissioner's Office
  • withdraw consent (if applicable)

Depending on our reason for using your information you may also be entitled to:

  • ask us to delete information we hold about you
  • have your information transferred electronically to yourself or to another organisation
  • object to decisions being made that significantly affect you
  • object to how we are using your information
  • stop us using your information in certain ways

The Trust will always seek to comply with your request however we may be required to hold or use your information to comply with legal duties. Please note: your request may delay or prevent us delivering a service to you.

For further information about your rights, including the circumstances in which they apply, see the guidance from the UK Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) on individuals’ rights under GDPR.

If you would like to exercise a right, please contact the Trust though this link.

Sharing or disclosing personal information

The LADO collects and shares personal information only where this is lawful, ensuring that we comply with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA 2018) requirements for processing through:

Article 6(1)(e) - the processing is necessary to perform a task in the public interest or for our official functions, and the task or function has a clear basis in law;

Article 9(2) (g) – Necessary for reasons of substantial public interest on the basis of Union or Member State law which is proportionate to the aim pursued and which contains appropriate safeguarding measures; and Sch.1, Pt.2, 1 - Substantial public interest conditions, for processing under the DPA 2018.

These articles under the GDPR and the DPA 2018 are supported by the following specific legislation:

  • Sections 11 of the Children Act 2004;
  • Chapter 2, section 5 of Working Together to Safeguard Children (2018).

Depending on the individual circumstances of each situation, the LADO may have to share information with other organisations to fulfil other duties and powers and to support the work we do together to safeguard children.

The LADO will inform the police if a crime is suspected and/or children’s social care if a child is considered to be at risk.

Complaints or queries

For further information about how the Trust handles personal information, and about rights to personal data, please see the Trust’s Privacy Statement.

For any queries or concerns, to request details of our privacy policy and how we collect and use personal information, please contact the Trust's Data Protection Officer at dpo@birminghamchildrenstrust.co.uk.

You can also seek advice or raise concerns with:

Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF

Tel: 0303 123 1113 (local rate) or 01625 545 745 (if you prefer to use a national rate number).

Published: April 2024