Privacy Notice and Data Protection

Privacy notice for Childrens Services

This privacy notice is to be read in conjunction with the full privacy notice.

This privacy notice sets out how Childrens services at the London Borough of Sutton will use and process your information.

What type of information is collected about you?

• personal identifiers and contacts (such as name, unique pupil number, contact details and address, details of family and close relations)
• characteristics (such as ethnicity, language, and free school meal eligibility, any relevant medical information)
• safeguarding information (such as court orders and professional involvement, child in care status including looked after or previously looked after early help, social care and health)
• special educational needs (including the needs and ranking, for example pastoral support plan (PSP), education, health and care plan (EHCP), SEND support plan, personal education plan (PEP), employment and education)
• attendance (such as sessions attended, number of absences, absence reasons and any previous schools attended)
• details and records of your childs care, support, wellbeing and any concerns or investigations
• details of each contact that we have with you and your child, including visits, correspondence, communications and documents
• relevant information from individuals involved in your childs care, including health and other care providers, carers and relatives
• behaviour and social information (such as exclusions and any relevant alternative provision placements put in place)

We need your information for the following services and functions:

• collate information from a variety of providers to inform an assessment and analysis of the needs of children and families (Children Act 1989, s 17)
• Safeguarding vulnerable children and young people (Children Act 1989, ss 17, 32 and 47; Children and Adoption Act 2002; Fostering Regulations 2011 and 2015; Care Act 2014; Children (Leaving Care) Act 2000)
• providing a proportionate intervention to vulnerable adults, children and familie
• participate in the national fraud initiative and other data matching exercises
• working with families at Tier 2, i.e. below statutory threshold (Children Act 1989, s 17)
• the provision of mental health support and children with disabilities services
• participate in the national Supporting Families Programme

Who your information may be shared with:

• the Department of Health and Social Care
• the Department for Education
• the Department for Work and Pensions
• the Department for Housing, Levelling Up, Housing and Communities
• the Home Office
• The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government
• HM Courts and Tribunals Service
• Schools
• the Citizens Advice Bureau
• Probation
• Housing
• Jobcentre Plus
• Adult social services
• Fraud department
• Youth offending team
• Charities
• Ofsted
• Adoption and Special Guardianship Leadership Board
• Cognus ( Education services provider)
• Health partners
• Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS)

Cognus

Cognus has authorised access to the following information within our Mosaic case management system to support their work with children and families:

• All About Me Reviews (child's care plan)
• Pathway Plan Forms
• Personal Education Plans
• Person Summary (front page of Mosaic)
• Placement Change Forms

This data sharing is necessary for Cognus to effectively provide services and support children's educational needs.

The Child Protection Information System (CP-IS)

Sutton Council shares information with health and social care organisations for child protection purposes. The information is shared using the CP-IS.

The CP-IS focuses on improving the protection of children who have previously been identified as vulnerable by social services when they visit the following NHS unscheduled care settings:

• Emergency departments
• Walk-in centres
• Out of hours GPs
• Minor injuries units
• Paediatric wards
• Maternity units
• Ambulance services

The system provides health professionals with prompt and easy access to key social care information that can help them to assess whether a child is at risk.

The ability to correctly diagnose abuse or neglect depends on having the whole picture. Giving staff in unscheduled care settings access to relevant social care information is essential to successfully identifying children who may be at risk.

The legal basis for processing your information

• Compliance with a legal obligation (e.g. safeguarding and promoting the welfare of Sutton children including those children placed out of authority, or if necessary to protect someone in an emergency, or if disclosure is required by the Police or other statutory bodies).
• Vital interests when collating information from a variety of providers to inform an assessment and analysis of the needs of children and families
• Tasks carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority
• Contract for the supply of services
• Consent

Use of Artificial Intelligence in Adult Social Care and Children’s Social Care

We are currently testing a number of Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools including Gemini, Magic Notes by Beam and Access Notes Centre (Access Group).  AI tools are used by Council staff in Social Care to process data including personal information discussed in calls, visits and meetings.  Social Workers are able to record conversations with colleagues, residents, carers, provider staff and others involved in the delivery of services to residents. Information will be recorded either on their work provided mobile phone and/or directly recorded within the Council's Google workspace.

Conversations will be transcribed and summarised, and a list of actions created. The tools are designed to extract the relevant parts of the conversation depending on the nature of the meeting. The use of AI aims to reduce the manual typing of conversation notes, improve the recording of notes and deliver better reviews and creation of care plans in a timely way. 

The information to be processed will include personal information, health information and care needs. Transcriptions will be checked for accuracy and outputs will be stored on the existing case management system (Mosaic) against individual records and within the Council’s Google workspace.   All information is processed and stored in the UK.

People will be told at the outset if an AI tool is being used and the call is being recorded.  
The lawful basis for the processing of personal data is set out below:

UK GDPR- Article 6 (1) (e)  (e) ‘Public task: the processing is necessary to exercise official functions, and the task or function has a clear basis in law.

Legal basis for sharing the information special categories of personal information (i.e. health information; 

UK GDPR- Article 9 (2 )(h) Health or social care (with a basis in law)

Whilst the legal basis is not consent, the legal basis of public task allows an objection to be made.  If anyone objects to the use of an AI tool at the start of a call then it will not be used. However if a recording is in progress when an objection is made, the recording will stop at that point but the recording made up to that point will be used otherwise the meeting will have been ineffective.
 

Caldicott Guardians

A Caldicott Guardian is a senior person responsible for protecting the confidentiality of people’s Social Care information and making sure it is used properly.

The Caldicott Guardian is responsible for ensuring the lawful and ethical processing of personal information, both within the Council and when it is shared with other organisations. 

All local authorities which provide social services must have a Caldicott Guardian, and their details must be published on the National Register of Caldicott Guardians.

Within Social Care the Assistant Director for Adult Social Care and the Assistant Director for Children's Social Care and Safeguarding are the registered Caldicott Guardians for their respective areas of responsibility.

The Caldicott Guardians can be contacted using the email addresses below:

CaldicottGuardianAdults@Sutton.gov.uk  

CaldicottGuardianChildrens@Sutton.gov.uk