Counter Terrorism – Channel Programme

In order to comply with the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR), where personal data relating to a data subject is collected, Lancashire County Council would like to provide you with the following details.

Identity and contact details of the data controller

  • Lancashire County Council, PO Box 78 County Hall, Fishergate, Preston, Lancashire, PR1 8XJ

Contact details of the data protection officer

  • Our Data Protection Officer is Paul Bond. You can contact him at dpo@lancashire.gov.uk or Lancashire County Council, PO Box 78 County Hall, Fishergate, Preston, Lancashire, PR1 8XJ

Purposes for processing

Channel was first piloted in 2007 and rolled out across England and Wales in April 2012.

Channel is a programme which focuses on providing support at an early stage to people who are identified as being vulnerable to being drawn into terrorism. The programme uses a multi-agency approach to protect vulnerable people by:

  • identifying individuals at risk
  • assessing the nature and extent of that risk
  • developing the most appropriate support plan for the individuals concerned

Channel may be appropriate for anyone who is vulnerable to being drawn into any form of terrorism. Channel is about ensuring that vulnerable children and adults of any faith, ethnicity or background receive support before their vulnerabilities are exploited by those that would want them to embrace terrorism, and before they become involved in criminal terrorist related activity.

Success of the programme is very much dependent on the co-operation and coordinated activity of partners. It works best when the individuals and their families fully engage with the programme and are supported in a consistent manner.

Lancashire County Council has a statutory duty under section 36 to 41 of the Counter Terrorism and Security Act 2015 to provide support for people vulnerable to being drawn into any form of terrorism.

Category of personal data being processed

  1. Personal data (information relating to a living, identifiable individual)
  2. Special category personal data (racial, ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade union membership, and the processing of genetic data, biometric data for the purpose of uniquely identifying a natural person, data concerning health or data concerning a natural person's sex life or sexual orientation)

Legal basis for processing personal data

The legal basis for processing your personal data, in accordance with the UK GDPR is:

(c) Legal Obligation: the processing is necessary for you to comply with the law. You must reference the applicable legislation if you wish to rely on this basis for processing.

(e) Public Task: the processing is necessary for you to perform a task in the public interest or for your official functions, and the task or function has a clear basis in law. You must reference the applicable task/function and its' basis in law if you wish to rely on this basis for processing.

Lancashire County Council relies on UK GDPR Article 6 (1) (c) Legal Obligation and UK GDPR Article 6 (1) (e) Public Task by virtue of the following legislation:

  • Processing of personal data is necessary for the purposes of the various Channel duties set out in Section 36 of the Counter Terrorism and Security Act (2015) and the revised Prevent Duty Guidance for England and Wales, to have due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism.
  • Other gateways to share information include but are not limited to Section 11 of the Children’s Act 2004, Section 42 of the Care Act 2014, Section 111 of the Local Government Act 1972 and Section 1 of the Localism Act 2011.

Legal basis for processing special categories of personal data

The legal basis for processing your special categories of personal data, in accordance with the UK GDPR is:

(g) Processing is necessary for reasons of substantial public interest.

Lancashire County Council relies on UK GDPR Article 9 (2) (g) Substantial Public Interest by virtue of the following legislation:

  • Data Protection Act (2018) Schedule 1 Part 2 (6) Statutory etc and government purposes
  • Processing of personal data is necessary for the purposes of the various Channel duties set out in Section 36 of the Counter Terrorism and Security Act (2015) and the revised Prevent Duty Guidance for England and Wales, to have due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism.
  • Other gateways to share information include but are not limited to Section 11 of the Children’s Act 2004, Section 42 of the Care Act 2014, Section 111 of the Local Government Act 1972 and Section 1 of the Localism Act 2011.

Recipients of the data

As part of the Channel process, personal information is shared securely and only where strictly necessary. Relevant information will be sought from other agencies as appropriate to inform an assessment.

Where there is a need this will be discussed at a multi-agency panel to consider whether intervention support should be offered.

The information will only be shared with relevant agencies. This may include: ·

  • Police
  • National Health Service (NHS)
  • Home Office or other central government departments (where required)
  • Immigration
  • Probation
  • Other local councils
  • Education providers

Information we share

In carrying out it's responsibilities as part of the Prevent Programme, Lancashire County Council may process the following categories of your personal data where it has a clear lawful basis for doing so,

  • Demographics (name, date of birth, gender, address, ethnicity)
  • Offending history
  • Living Arrangements
  • Family and personal relationships
  • Statutory education
  • Neighbourhood
  • Lifestyle
  • Substance misuse
  • Emotional and mental health
  • Perceptions of self
  • Thinking and behaviour
  • Attitudes to engagement in relevant activity
  • Motivation to change
  • Cultural factors
  • Existing support provided by local authorities other support services

Any transfers to another country

  • No

Retention periods

Lancashire County Council will only store your information for as long as is legally required or in situations where there is no legal retention period they will follow established best practice.

Your rights

You have certain rights under the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR), these are the right:

  • to be informed via Privacy Notices such as this.
  • to withdraw your consent. If we are relying on your consent to process your data then you can remove this at any point.
  • of access to any personal information the council holds about yourself. To request a copy of this information you must make a subject access request in writing. You are entitled to receive a copy of your personal data within 1 calendar month of our receipt of your subject access request. If your request is complex then we can extend this period by a further two months, if we need to do this we will contact you. You can request a subject access request, either via a letter or via an email to Information Governance Team, address below.
  • of rectification, we must correct inaccurate or incomplete data within one month.
  • to erasure. You have the right to have your personal data erased and to prevent processing unless we have a legal obligation to process your personal information.
  • to restrict processing. You have the right to suppress processing. We can retain just enough information about you to ensure that the restriction is respected in future.
  • to data portability. We can provide you with your personal data in a structured, commonly used, machine readable form when asked.
  • to object. You can object to your personal data being used for profiling, direct marketing or research purposes.
  • in relation to automated decision making and profiling, to reduce the risk that a potentially damaging decision is taken without human intervention.

If you want to exercise any of these rights then you can do so by contacting:

Information Governance Team
Lancashire County Council
PO Box 78
County Hall
Preston
PR1 8XJ

Email: dpo@lancashire.gov.uk

To ensure that we can deal with your request as efficiently as possible you will need to include your current name and address, proof of identity (a copy of your driving licence, passport or two different utility bills that display your name and address), as much detail as possible regarding your request so that we can identify any information we may hold about you, this may include your previous name and address, date of birth and what council service you were involved with.

Further information

If you would like more information about this specific programme then please contact CounterTerrorismandPrevent@lancashire.gov.uk.

For more information about how we use personal information see Lancashire County Council's full privacy notice.

If you wish to raise a complaint on how we have handled your personal data, you can contact the Information Governance team who will investigate the matter.

Lancashire County Council, PO Box 78 County Hall, Fishergate, Preston, Lancashire, PR1 8XJ or email: dataprotection@lancashire.gov.uk

If you are not satisfied with our response or believe we are processing your personal data not in accordance with the law you can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO).