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Privacy Notice - Fostering and Adoption

Privacy Notice - Fostering and Adoption Service

What this privacy notice is for

Our core data protection obligations and commitments are set out in the council’s primary privacy notice at:

This notice provides additional privacy information for:

  • Foster carers and those persons being assessed as prospective foster carers;
  • Adopters and those persons being assessed as prospective

Updating our privacy notices

We may update or revise our privacy notices at any time so please refer to the version published on our website for the most up to date details

What do we use your information for?

We collect your personal information for the following purpose(s):

  • Assessment and support of foster carers and adopters;
  • To enable us to measure whether services are effective

What categories of personal information do we use?

Personal information can be anything that identifies and relates to a living person. This can include information that when linked with other information, allows a person to be uniquely identified. For example, this could be your name and contact details.

The law treats some types of personal information as ‘special’ because the information requires more protection due to its sensitivity. This information consists of:

  • Racial or ethnic origin
  • Sexuality and sexual life
  • Religious or philosophical beliefs
  • Trade union membership
  • Political opinions
  • Genetic and bio-metric data
  • Physical or mental health
  • Criminal convictions and offences

In order to carry out these purposes we collect and obtain the following personal information.

Category of personal data

Special/Sensitive

Name, gender and date of birth

  

Address and telephone number

  

Ethnicity and language spoken

Yes

Reason for referral (e.g. relating to financial and social

circumstances, lifestyle and behaviour, physical and mental health)

Yes

Involvement with other services

Yes

Legal basis for processing

The legal basis for processing and sharing of your personal information in regard to assessments of, and support to, foster carers and adopters is based upon Public Task. Data Protection Act 2018 – Article 6 Lawfulness of processing, 1.e. 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. 

Exceptionally, information may also be shared if it is necessary to protect individuals from harm, or because a serious crime has, or maybe, committed. Various pieces of legislation set out the circumstances in which organisations are permitted, or required, to do this. These include the Crime and Disorder Act 1998, Children Acts 1989 and 2004, and Care Act 2014.

Information sharing/recipients

We may share personal information about you with the following organisations/types of organisations:

  • Organisations or Council teams delivering Fostering and Adoption Services so that they can provide these services, including the Regional Adoption Agency, Greater Manchester Combined Authority and Eleven Marketing and Communications Ltd.;
  • Children’s or adults social services, Greater Manchester Police, health services and other relevant organisations in order to establish your suitability to adopt or foster a

As well as information collected directly from you, we also obtain or receive information from:

  • Children’s or adults social services, Greater Manchester Police, health services and other relevant organisations in order to establish your suitability to adopt or foster a
  • Organisations who provide support services for foster carers and adopters (e.g. social services, education services including schools, housing providers, drug and alcohol services, NHS services, Department for Work and Pensions).

Information will only be shared where it is relevant to do so, and the level of information shared will be proportionate to the needs identified.

Data Transfers beyond European Economic Area

We do not transfer any of your personal information outside the European Economic Area (‘EEA’).

Automated Decisions

All the decisions we make about you involve human intervention.

How long do we keep your data?

For fostering:

Records relating to foster carers, must be retained for 10 years from the date the approval to be a foster carer is terminated

Where an application to foster is not approved, or is withdrawn, records must be retained for 3 years from the date the application was refused or withdrawn

For adoptions:

Where an adoption order was made on or after 30th December 2005, records must be retained for 100 years from the date of the adoption order.

Where the adoption order was made before 30th December 2005, records must be retained for 75 years from the date of adoption order.

Where an application to adopt is not approved, or is withdrawn, records must be retained for 10 years from the refusal or withdrawal of the adoption application.

Where can I get advice?

More information on how to seek advice in order to exercise your rights, raise a concern or complain about the handling of your personal information by the council can be found in the council’s privacy notice which can be found at: