Privacy Policy

1        Introduction

1.1     Our Scout Group knows that you care how information about you or your child is used and shared, and we appreciate your trust in us to do that carefully and sensibly. This notice describes the privacy policy of our Scout Group.

1.2     We last updated this policy in July 2021. It complies with the UK General Data Protection Regulation.  For more information about this Regulation, you can visit www.ico.org.uk and search ‘UK GDPR’.

2        Personal information we collect

2.1    If your child is, has been, or may become, a Beaver, Cub or Scout in our Scout Group, we collect the following information about them:

• name

• date of birth

• address

• parent and/or carer details

• the badges and other Scouting achievements they attain

• any information about your child that may help us to keep them and others safe, or help us help them get the most out of their Scouting (for example, food allergies, and medical and behavioural conditions)

• if section 2.7 below applies, your child’s contact details (for example, their email address and/or mobile phone number).

2.2     If your child is going to do an activity (for example, going canoeing) we may ask for additional information relevant to that activity (for example, whether they can swim).  We tend to keep this information for as long as we need it for that activity, so we may ask you for the same information again for another activity.  We do this because it is important that we have up-to-date information for each activity for which it is relevant.

2.3     Sometimes The Scout Association (www.scouts.org.uk, which is the overarching Scouting body for the UK) ask us to give them anonymised data, for instance about the gender, race and religion of the Beavers, Cubs and Scouts in our Scout Group.  We understand The Scout Association use this type of information to help check for and demonstrate diversity and inclusion across Scouting in the UK.   If we collect these types of data for this purpose, we only keep the data about specific individuals long enough for us to compile the anonymised data, then we destroy it.  This means we may ask you for information about your child that cannot change (for example, your race) more than once.  You do not have to provide us with these types of information; you are completely free to choose not to if you wish.

2.4    If you are a parent or carer of, or an emergency contact for, a Scout, Beaver or Cub we keep your name and contact details (for example, your email address(es) and phone number(s)).

2.5    If you pay the subscription fees for your child to participate in Scouting, and you allow us to, we keep details of your status as a UK taxpayer to help us claim Gift Aid.  If you make payments to us via Gocardless we will be able to see some of the personal information you have shared with Gocardless, for instance, your contact details but we cannot see your bank account details.

2.6     If you are a Leader, a member of the Executive Committee or another type of volunteer in our Scout Group, or you tell us you are interested in helping our Scout Group, we keep your name and contact details, and other details relevant to your role in our Scout Group or how you might be able to help us.

2.7    If you are a Scout and you want us to tell you things as well as telling your parent(s) or carer(s), we will keep your contact details to do this.

2.8     If you want us to put your child on a waiting list to join one of our Beaver Colonies, Cub Packs, or Scout Troops, we keep your name and contact details, and the name and date of birth of your child, until you tell us you no longer want to be on the waiting list, or your child becomes too old to join Scouts.

2.9    When you or your child leaves our Scout Group, unless you tell us not to, we will keep details of you or your child and their participation in Scouting on our leavers list for as long as we think you may want us to:

• confirm your participation in Scouting to a third party, for example, another charitable organisation, or

• transfer your personal information to another Scout Group, or Explorer Scout Group.

3        What we use your personal information for

3.1     We use your personal information to:

• tell you about the Scouting activities relevant to you or your child, and about things that are or may be relevant to our Scout Group as whole

• keep your child and others safe when doing Scouting activities

• facilitate any present or potential future involvement of you or your child with Scouting

• enable us to confirm your participation in Scouting to a third party, if you ask us to do this in the future.

3.2      If we use your or your child’s information for anything else, we will ask or tell you first.

3.3    When we use your or your child’s personal information, we will be doing so under one or more of the following bases for lawful use:

• you (or your child if they are 13 or over) have given consent for us to use that personal information for one or more specific purposes

• us using that personal information is necessary for you or your child to participate in Scouting activities, or to be on a waiting list to join our Scout Group or stay on our leavers list

• us using that personal information is necessary to protect the vital interests of you, your child or of another person (for example, their safety and wellbeing)

• us using that personal information is necessary for the pursuit of legitimate interests of our Scout Group or a third party (for example, to comply with an insurance policy).

3.4      The basis on which you provide us with personal information is contractual (or, if your child is on our waiting list, precontractual).

3.5      We will store personal information about you or your child that we hold for the purposes set out in section 3.1 for no more than a year after we stop needing it for any of those purposes.  Personal information that we have for a specific purpose, we aim to delete or destroy as soon as reasonably practicable after we are sure we no longer need that information for that purpose.

4        Photos and videos

4.1      We will not take or keep photos or videos in which you or your child is a focal point without your consent (or just that of your child if they are 13 or older).  You can withdraw your consent at any time.  We take care only to take and keep images of young people in suitable clothing and not to take or keep images that might upset or embarrass a young person.  If you would like us to avoid taking any photo or video that includes you or your child, please tell your or your child’s Leader.

4.2      When our sections are not able to meet face-to-face, we sometimes hold meetings via Zoom. When we do this, we do not record the meetings and we follow the safeguarding protocols recommended by The Scout Association.

5        Our website and social media sites

5.1     Our website is hosted by 123-Reg. We do not collect data about visitors to our website.  Our website does not use cookies.  We will only include your personal information on our website with your consent (or that of your parent or carer if you are under 13).

5.2    A Leader may set up a closed social media group (for example, on Facebook® or WhatsApp®) for parents and carers of their Beavers, Cubs or Scouts to share photos and updates about what their Beavers, Cubs or Scouts are doing.  If a Leader runs this type of social media group, they will only share personal information about you or your child with that social media group with your consent.  If you do consent, and if you join one of these social media groups, please note:

• as with any social media group, once a photo or other information is posted, any member of the group can see that photo or information, and can copy it elsewhere

• soon after you or your child stops being involved in the Beaver Colony, Cub Pack or Scout Troop for which that social media group is run, your membership of that group will be stopped

• if you do take a copy of a photo in which another person is a focal point or other information about another person, and you use it for anything other than a purely personal or household activity, you should ask that other person’s permission first.

5.3    You can withdraw your consent at any time.  If you do this, we will take down your personal information from the sites and groups we control.  We will do this as soon as reasonably practicable.

6        Disclosing your personal information outside our Scout Group

6.1      We may share personal information we hold about you or your child with a third party:

• to facilitate any present or potential future involvement of you or your child with Scouting (for example, if we use an independent company to take your child climbing, we may give the climbing company some information about your child)

• to help keep your child and others safe 

• if we are obliged by law to do so

• if you ask us to, for example, if you ask us to confirm your involvement in Scouting to a potential employer.

6.2    If we share personal information we hold about you or your child with a third party for anything else, we will ask or tell you first.    

7     Storing your personal information

7.1   We keep the personal information we hold:

• on Google Drive

• in the mailboxes the Leaders and Executive Committee members use for Scouting business.  These mailboxes have the domain “@1stbishopsstortford.org.uk” and are Gmail accounts

• in Online Scout Manager

• in Gocardless

• in Compass (only about Leaders, some Executive Committee members and some other adult helpers)

and, if we have consent:

• on our website

• in the social media groups described in section 5.2 above.

7.2      We may also sometimes load (or ask you to load) personal information onto local drives and other online platforms (for example, Eventbrite), and create paper copies, for temporary use.  When we do this, we are mindful of keeping your personal information safe.

7.3     We limit who in our Scout Group has access to your or your child’s personal information on Google Drive.  For instance, if your child is in one of our Beaver Colonies, the Leader of that Beaver Colony and other regular helpers of that Colony will have access to your child’s personal information but generally the Leaders of other Colonies, Cub Packs and Scout Troops will not.

7.4   For more information about security and privacy:

• in Google Drive and Gmail, you can visit www.google.co.uk and click on the Privacy link

• in Online Scout Manager, you can visit www.onlinescoutmanager.co.uk and click on the Security & GDPR link

• in Gocardless, you can visit www.gocardless.com and click on Security and Privacy links

• in Compass, you can visit The Scout Association’s webpage about Compass at https://compasssupport.scouts.org.uk/?page_id=59643
  

• on our website, you can visit our website host’s webpages at www.123Reg.co.uk
  

• in one of the social media groups described in section 5.2 above, you can visit the home page of the organisation that hosts that social media group.

8        Your access to, and control over, the personal information we hold about you or your child

8.1     All our Beaver Colonies, Cub Packs and Scout Troops will use Online Scout Manager (www.onlinescoutmanager.co.uk) and Gocardless (www.gocardless.com).  When your child joins our Scout Group, you will be able to see and update your and your child’s contact and other information using your My.Scout account in Online Scout Manager.  We also maintain our waiting list and leavers list in Online Scout Manager.

8.2   If you do ask us to delete personal information about you or your child, we will try to delete the personal information we hold that you cannot delete yourself as soon as reasonably practicable. Please note, we will not be able to delete copies of your or your child’s personal information:

• if we are obliged by law to keep a record of that information (for example, for tax purposes in connection with Gift Aid, or if your child is injured at Scouts and we record this in our accident book);

• that we have shared outside our Scout Group; or

• if we have a legitimate interest in keeping that information (for example, if you made a complaint about our Scout Group we might consider it necessary to keep details of your complaint and how we dealt with it).

8.3     If you notice any of the information we hold about you or your child is wrong or out of date, please tell us (for example, tell your child’s Leader) so we can correct it.

8.4    You have the right to ask us:

• for a copy of all the personal information we hold about you or your child

• to delete or correct any of that personal information

• if you object to us using any of that personal information for a particular purpose, to ask us to stop using that personal information for that purpose

• if you want to transfer that personal information to another organisation (for example, another Scout group), to help you with transferring that information.

9        How to contact us

9.1     The data controller for the personal information we hold is our Scout Group.  We do not have a data protection officer (we do not have to), but the lead person for data protection in our Scout Group is a member of our Executive Committee.

9.2    If:

• you want to make a formal request to obtain a copy of any or all the personal information we hold about you or your child; or

• you want us to delete or correct all or any personal information we hold about you or your child that you cannot delete or change yourself; or

• you have any questions about our Scout Group’s privacy and data protection policies,you can contact our Scout Group’s data protection lead at  kate.richardson@1stbishopsstortford.org.uk, copying the Group Scout Leader at simon.carter@1stbishopsstortford.org.uk and your or your child’s Leader (if they have one).