How we use your personal information

We collect and use any personal information that you provide us through different means, such as online and paper interactions or forms, telephone, email, fax, or face-to-face contact, or when you visit our website (which logs your internet protocol (IP) address). As the controller of this information, we determine how we manage it:

for the purpose for which you provided the information, e.g., services we have provided in relation to fire and rescue services, police and crime, public service reform, productivity and skills related programmes, housing & regeneration, health and wellbeing or the environment and waste management;
to communicate with you, provide services and information appropriate to your needs;
to monitor our performance in providing services to you, to gather statistical information to allow us to plan future provision of services to you and to obtain your opinion about our services;
to meet various legal or contractual requirements;
for the prevention and/or detection of crime;
to process financial transactions including grants, payments and benefits directly involving us or where we are acting on behalf of other government bodies such as the Department for Work and Pensions
to enforce the law in areas such as licensing, planning enforcement, trading standards and food safety including regulatory duties.
in the event of civil disasters or emergencies
where it is permitted under the Data Protection Act 2018 / UK GDPR, for example, to comply with legal obligations, or for us to seek legal advice or undertake legal proceedings;
for marketing purposes to keep you updated on the latest news and services;
for home or commercial fire safety assessments
for accident investigation and road safety
to ensure the health and safety of our staff and members of the public using our services;
to manage all types of consultation including online forms
to manage all types of complaints and feedback
to manage all types of survey including online forms
for job applications and employee information
for general processing where you have given your consent for us to do so;
to improve the experience of visitors to our websites including manage your online and marketing preferences.

We also collect information via CCTV. CCTV helps us to protect our properties, vehicles and premises, to provide a safer environment for people who work at and visit these locations including preventing and investigating crime. For these reasons, the information processed may include:

visual images or recordings including people’s faces
personal appearance, and behaviours.
information may be about employees,
customers and clients, going about their daily business
offenders and suspected offenders, who access the offices without authorisation
members of the public and those inside, entering or in the immediate vicinity of the area under surveillance.

We use also use your information for research purposes to produce statistical information that helps us to prioritise activities, target and plan the provision of services. We ensure that your identity is not revealed where possible when we use your information in this way, it will be specifically to:

maintain our own accounts and records
support and manage our employees
manage our property
enable licensing and regulatory activities
provide services required by us as a public service
prevent crime and prosecute offenders including the use of CCTV
administer any corporate activities we are required to carry out as a data controller and as a public authority
undertake research
provide commercial and non-commercial activities that we undertake as a public body
support internal financial and corporate functions
manage archived records for historical and research reasons
undertake data matching for local and national fraud initiatives
improve public health
assist in disputes or potential cases of malpractice
investigate complaints

We may also use your information to help to target some of our services and let you know what information or activities may be available to help you. This may include:

promoting the services we provide
marketing, for instance related to our local tourism
carrying out health and public awareness campaigns
providing leisure and cultural services
local fraud initiative
national fraud initiative
carrying out surveys

When communicating to you electronically we will abide by the Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003 (PECR).

We use a range of organisations to either store personal information or help deliver our services to you and where we are permitted to do so by law.

The following is a broad summary of the types of organisations your personal information may be shared with

Internally:

To provide appropriate, timely and effective services, we may share basic information about you such as your name or address between departments within the four bodies mentioned in the introduction to this Privacy Notice (GMCA, GMFRS, PCC and GMWR). This is so we can keep your information as up to date as possible and so we can improve our services to you. However, we ensure that staff within these shared services can only access the information they need in order to do their job.

Partner organisations under Data Sharing Agreements or protocols:

We have data sharing arrangements in place with local agencies and partner organisations, who we work with to provide certain services to you. For example, we may sign up to or follow local or national protocols, such as the National Fraud Initiative, which requires us to share particular personal information in a certain way. Therefore, under data sharing arrangements, certain personal information is shared for a specific purpose. The agency or organisation receiving the information must only use that information as outlined within that data sharing agreement so that they can to carry out that specific tasks in line with the agreed purpose. They must always keep your data safe and secure and process it lawfully as outlined in that agreement.

Third Parties:

We may have to share your personal information with a third party if the law requires us to do so. For example, we may provide your information to the courts, either because they have ordered us to do so, or because we need a court order for something (e.g., to prevent or detect crime). In all cases, we will follow data protection laws when we share data internally or externally.

We may also share your information with a third party even if the law does not oblige us to do so, if we think that there is a very important reason for doing so. However, we will only override your privacy right if the risk is serious. This is rare, but we may share your information in order to:

find and stop crime and fraud;
protect the public, our staff or other professionals against any serious risks
protect a child, for example where we suspect they may be subject to abuse, their needs are not being met, or they are at risk in some other way;
protect adults who are thought to be at risk, for example if they are frail, confused or cannot understand what is happening to them

Some of the third parties that we may share your personal information with are (but not limited to):

those who assist us in providing services, and who perform technical operations such as data storage and data hosting for us.
families, guardians, carers, associates and representatives of the people whose personal data we are processing (including legal advisers and counsel);
local and central government departments (such as the Cabinet Office, Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government, the Department for Work and Pensions, Her Majesty's Revenues and Customs, Border Agency);
Local Authorities
Greater Manchester Police or other UK police forces.
Other UK Fire and Rescue Services
debt collection and tracing agencies;
current, past and prospective employers;
educators and examining bodies;
hospitals, GPs or other healthcare, social and welfare organisations;
providers of goods and services;
financial organisations;
business
private investigators;
press and the media;
professional advisors and consultants;
professional bodies;
housing associations and landlords;
voluntary and charitable organisations;
religious organisations;
the National Fraud Agency;
ombudsman and regulatory authorities;
courts and tribunals;
enforcement agents;
regulatory bodies;
law enforcement and prosecuting authorities, including international law enforcement and examining bodies;

Research and evaluation partners

In addition to sharing information to improve the delivery of services, we may also share information with other service providers, survey and research organisations to create statistical and anonymised or pseudonymised data to:

better plan how we provide services to our community;
help improve services and to make sure they are effective;
be published in various reports that will be publicly available;
improve the health of the population as a whole

Where we anonymise the data, we make sure that it does not reveal you, your family or any individual person. This means that any information that shows who you are, or your family or carers will be removed before the results of any research or evaluation that we or others publish (including in public reports).

When we pseudonymise data, this type of personal data will be processed in a way that makes it harder to identify you, your family or carers. We will use pseudonymised techniques such as replacing, removing or transforming information that identifies specific individuals such as names, addresses, phone numbers, etc., and keep that information separate from the rest of the data. For example, a name can be replaced with a unique number or a code.

The data used for research and evaluation will not have any impact on you because it will not be used to make any decisions about you or affect your rights or benefits. It will only assist us to improve the quality, effectiveness, and delivery of help across Greater Manchester by providing us with insights and feedback on our services and the needs of the people we help.

Who do we share your information with?

Using your personal information differently

What we do before we share information

How the law lets us use your personal information