Privacy notice for the Humber Emergency Planning Service (HEPS)

What do we use the information for?

HEPS collects, processes and holds your personal information in order to provide our services effectively.

• To support the production of effective emergency plans 
• To maintain effective emergency plans. 

We also use information to improve our services so that they are more appropriate to people’s requirements.  We recognise that your personal information is important to you, and we take our responsibilities for ensuring that we collect and manage it proportionately, correctly and safely very seriously.

What information do we hold and use?

We collect and process the following information:

• Personal information (including full name, full residential address, date of birth) 
• Location data (including postcode and telephone number)
• Contact details (such as email address)
• Characteristics (such as sex, disability).

On what grounds do we use the information?

The HEPS collects and lawfully processes your personal information under the following:

• Civil Contingencies Act 2004
• Control of Major Accident Hazard Regulations 2015 
• Pipeline Safety Regulations 1996. 

We process personal data for the following reasons:

• GDPR Article 6(1)(a) – the data subject has given consent to the processing of his or her personal data for one or more specific purposes;
• GDPR Article 6(1)(c) – processing is necessary for compliance with legal obligation to which the East Riding of Yorkshire Council is subject; 
• GDPR Article 6(1)(d) – processing is necessary in order to protect the vital interests of the data subject or another natural person; and 
• GDPR Article 6(1)(e) – processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest in the exercise of official authority vested in the East Riding of Yorkshire Council. 

We process special category data for the following reason:

• GDPR Article 9(2)(a) - the data subject has given explicit consent to the processing of those personal data for one or more specified purposes, except where Union or Member State law provide that the prohibition referred to in paragraph 1 may not be lifted by the data subject.

How do we collect this information?

We collect information in the following ways: 

• Paper, electronic or online forms
• CCTV
• Use of audio monitoring equipment
• Email
• Telephone
• Face to face, with one of our employees, or one of our partners
• From third-party sources who have a duty to share information to enable us to meet our statutory obligations (such as members of the Local Resilience Forum including organisations such as  the emergency services, the NHS and other local authorities).

Who do we share your information with?

We may disclose your information to others, but only where this is necessary either to comply with our legal obligations or as permitted by Data Protection legislation.  . We may share your it  with other public service bodies in an emergency, usually through the Local Resilience Forum including the NHS, the emergency services, the Environment Agency,  utility providers and other local authorities.  

We may also share information with Everbridge Inc, who provides a notification system on behalf of the HEPS.  Everbridge Inc. have access to your information in order support our system; the company  will not use your information for any other purpose.

Everbridge Privacy Notice (external website)

The reasons why we may share your data with other public bodies are as follows:

• To protect vulnerable adults who may be at risk of harm or abuse;
• To help you in the event of an emergency;
• To improve our understanding of your needs to enable us to inform you of other relevant services;
• To monitor and improve our performance and delivery of services;
• For the prevention and or detection of crime;
• Where necessary to protect individuals from the risk of harm or injury; and 
• Where otherwise permitted under the General Data Protection legislation.

We will only disclose your sensitive or confidential information if we are legally required to do so, or where we have good reason to believe that failing to share the information would put you or someone else at risk of harm.

We will not pass your personal information to external organisations for marketing or sales purposes or for any commercial use without your prior expressed consent.

How long do we store it and is it secure?

HEPS has a retention schedule in place to ensure that information is only held for as long as it is needed. We will not keep your information for longer than is required to by law. Your information will be disposed of in a controlled and secure manner in accordance with the council’s Records Management and Data Quality Policy. The council’s IT security and confidentiality policies ensure that your information is protected, and accessed only by staff directly involved in your case.  

For information on how long your information will be held, visit the retention page.  

What rights do you have?

The rights that you have depend upon the grounds  in which we collected your information. All of the rights you could have are outlined on the data protection rights page. 

In most cases, people who have had involvement with  HEPS will have the following rights: 

• The right of access - you are entitled to see the information we hold about you 
• The right to rectification - we will amend information accordingly, if any information we hold about you  is incorrect
• The right to restrict processing - you may wish to limit how we use your data
• The right to object - in addition to the right to limit the use of your data, you also have a right to object to the use of your data for certain actions
• The right to erasure / right to be forgotten - in certain circumstances, you may be able to ask for some of the information we hold to be deleted.

To exercise any of your above rights, please visit the data protection rights page for more information.

Where can I find out more?

If you want to know more about how the council uses information, your rights or have a concern about the way we are collecting or using your personal data, we request that you raise your concern with us in the first instance; contact details are available on the general privacy information page.  Alternatively, you can contact the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO). The ICO is the UK’s independent authority set up to uphold information rights in the public interest and they handle public concerns regarding organisations information rights practices. 

Information Commissioner’s Office (external website) 

When was this privacy notice last updated?

We will continually review and update this privacy notice to reflect any changes in our services, feedback from customers, and to comply with any changes in the law. This privacy notice was last updated on 01 February 2021.