Birmingham Youth Offending Service Victim Support Privacy Notice

Under data protection law, Birmingham Children’s Trust needs your consent to process your personal data for the purpose of providing support to victims of crime. You are not obliged to give this data, and if you refuse it will not affect any other engagements you have with the Trust. We will only contact you and engage with you once your consent has been received from the Police.

Who we are

Birmingham Children’s Trust (‘the Trust’) will act as a ‘data controller’ for any personal data that the Youth Offending Service receive or process about you coming from the Police and Crown Prosecution Service where the offences committed by children.  This personal data contains witness statements, Victim Personal Impact Statements and Police interview records.

The Trust is committed to respecting and keeping safe any personal data you share with us, or that we get from other agencies/organisations. The Trust will ensure that the data you give us is processed in line with our data protection policies and in accordance with your rights under the Data Protection Act 2018 and the UK General Data Protection Regulation.

Should you wish to contact us, please do so at birminghamyos@birminghamchildrenstrust.co.uk

For any other questions or queries about the processing of your personal data, please contact dpo@birminghamchildrenstrust.co.uk

How information about you will be used

The information that you share with us is treated as highly confidential. We will only contact you and engage with you once your consent has been received from the Police.

There are some situations where we are duty bound to share information even if you do not agree, these are if we have serious concerns about the safety or welfare of you or a child, if we think there is a risk to you or others and to prevent a crime. Any data you provide will be stored on a secure database in line with Birmingham Children’s Trust procedures with access restricted to a limited number of people who are authorised to access it.

Why we collect and share information

At Birmingham Youth Offending Service (BYOS) we collect and share information about you to help us:

• Understand the impact of the offence on you and make sure we offer the right emotional support, practical assistance and advice/help if you request our input
• Protect you as a victim of crime
• Prevent further crime
• Make communities safer
• Improve the services we provide
• Execute Court Orders where a child has committed the offence
• Provide you with an opportunity to take part in restorative justice
• Provide you with information about the young person’s progress
• Signpost you to appropriate services if you need additional or ongoing support
• Fulfil legal obligations
• Campaign for change in the Criminal Justice sector on areas affecting people impacted by crime

What information we collect

• Your full name and any others name you go by
• Your date of birth
• Your address
• The telephone numbers we can contact you on and who these belong to
• The language or languages you speak

Where your is information stored

BYOS will store as much information as we can electronically on the Trust’s secure network with appropriate access control and IT security.

The officers will ensure that confidential information on paper is kept secure and private from people who should not have access to it, and that it is locked away at the end of the day.

Information relating to the victims of crime is stored separately from information about the people responsible for committing crime to ensure confidentiality.

Recipients or categories of recipient of the personal data

Your personal data will only be shared with other organisations with your consent and strictly on a ‘need to know basis.’ We will only share what is necessary to help to protect you, to reduce re-offending, and to make communities safer.

The recipients below are not exhaustive:

• Police
• Courts
• Staff in the Trust who are working with the child who has committed the offence against you
• Probation – known as either the National Probation Service (NPS) or Community Rehabilitation Services (CRC) – if the child has committed a serious violence or sexual offence and receives a prison sentence of 12 months or more, or if the child turns 18 and is transferring to the supervision of NPS or CRC
• Other Youth Offending Teams where the child might have moved to or have come from
• Any other identified agencies who may be able to offer additional support

There are exceptional circumstances where we may have to disclose your personal data without your consent:

• Where the Trust believes that either you or someone else is at risk of significant harm; The Trust has a statutory duty to report any issues relating to child protection or safeguarding
• Where there is legal obligation to disclose your personal information, such as a court order or serious case review.

We rely upon the following laws to process your personal data:

• The Data Protection General Regulations (2018)
• The Crime and Disorder Act (1998)
• Working Together to Safeguard Children (2015)
• The Victims Code (2020)
• Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act 2004
• The Children Act (2004)
• The Human Rights Act (1998)
• Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999.
• Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984
• The Common Law Duty Of confidence

Further to this, we may anonymise your personal data and use the anonymised data for:

• Analysing the services and where necessary gain more funding
• Creating more awareness for support available for victims of crime caused by children
• Monitoring our service
• Improving the quality of the services we deliver

Retaining Your Information

We will retain your personal data for only as long as is necessary, and in line with our organisation’s record retention schedules.

Your Rights

Under the Data Protection Act 2018 and the General Data Protection Regulations you are entitled to know what personal data Birmingham Children’s Trust is processing about you. You can also contact the Trust to exercise the following rights:

• The right of access to your own personal data
• The right to request rectification or deletion of your personal data
• The right to object to the processing of your personal data
• The right to request a copy of the information you provide us in machine readable format
• The right to withdraw your consent to any processing that is solely reliant upon your consent

In the event that you wish to complain about the way that your personal data has been handled by Birmingham Children’s Trust, you should write to the Data Protection Officer and clearly outline your case to dpo@birminghamchildrenstrust.co.uk

Your complaint will then be investigated in accordance with the Trust’s information assurance procedure. If you remain dissatisfied with the way your personal data has been handled, you may refer the matter to the Information Commissioner’s Office whose contact details are below:

Email: casework@ico.org.uk

Tel: 0303 123 1113

Write to:
Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF