Highways privacy notice

Everything we do with information about people, including how we collect it and who we share it with, has to comply with the Data Protection Act and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) that came into force in May 2018. A key part of this is being open about how we use information and what rights you have in respect of information we hold about you.

This privacy notice sets out the information for the Council’s Highways Service which covers:

• Traffic management, including signals, signage, event permits, parking
• Highways maintenance
• Road safety
• Highway Asset Management including management of rights of way, Common Land and Village Green registers, access rights and land owner deposits
• Highway records search requests and CON29 enquiries of the local authority
• Highways development projects
• Street Lighting

If anything in this notice is not clear, or if you have further queries, please get in contact with the Council’s Data Protection Officer using the details at the end of this notice.

What information do we hold

We collect information about people who contact the Council to: report a highway maintenance or safety issue, apply for or are subjects of applications for a highway licence/permit including section 50 licenses, process parking fines, purchase a highways service, request highways, public rights of way or Common Land and Village Green records information, submit a CON29 enquiry of the local authority, apply to make a change to the List of Streets or Definitive Map and Statement, become involved in highways projects or programmes, enter into legal agreements, request information or comment on highways in general or as part of a consultation. The information we collect varies according the purpose of the contact.

Applications for our services are not restricted to people living or working in Cambridgeshire. Anyone is entitled to contact the Council about our Highways Service. The information we hold may include:

• Your name
• Your address
• Your telephone number(s)
• Your email address
• Payment details (card numbers etc.) which are held securely and encrypted in the Councils Financial systems
• Vehicle registration number
• Further personal details such as gender and age, of anyone involved in a road accident on the public highway, which includes human injury or death (as recorded on a 'STATS19' report form used by police officers in Great Britain)
• Site location information provided in your application for a highway service

Why do we have it and what do we use it for

Much of what we do in Highways is governed by legislation, set nationally, which requires us to provide various services across the adopted highway in Cambridgeshire. We process personal data to deliver public tasks outlined in the follow pieces of legislation:

• Local Government Act 2000
• Highways Act (HA)1980
• Traffic Management Act 2004 (Parking Enforcement)
• New Roads and Streetworks Act (NRSWA) 1991
• Road Traffic Act 2016
• Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984
• Health And Safety at Work Act 1974 (HASAWA)
• Town and Country Planning Act 1990
• Freedom of information (FOI) act 2000
• Environmental Information Regulations (EIR) 2004
• Local Land Charges Act 1975
• Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000
• Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981
• Commons Registration Act 1965
• Commons Act 2006
• Growth and Infrastructure Act 2013
• Human Rights Act 1998
• Equality Act 2010

We also provide statutory services in our role as the Commons Registration Authority which involve maintaining and revealing information contained in the Registers of Common Land and Town/Village Greens and processing applications to amend these records.

The information we collect and store is also used to provide an auditable record of service delivery and enables us to contact people initiating reports/issues to request further information or provide updates.

Whenever we collect information, we always limit this to only the details that might be needed and we ensure that it is used, and stored, safely and securely. We require anyone we share information with, or who uses it on our behalf, to do so too. All Highways staff have received training on data protection and information security.

Who we share information with and why

In order to deliver a range of highway services, to undertake our statutory and non-statutory duties as a Highway Authority and for us to deliver associated projects or programmes, it is often necessary for us to share information across the Council, with our Contractors or Agents, with Elected Councillors and Parish Councils and with other partner agencies and government departments such as the Police (in regard to road safety), the DVLA, Network Rail, District Councils within Cambridgeshire, National Highways (formerly Highways England) and other Authorities who are members of the Eastern Highways Alliance.

When we publish information in public we will follow procedures that we have in place to remove personal data associated with the record wherever possible.

How long we keep hold of information for

We only keep information for as long as it is needed. This will be based on either a legal requirement (where a law says we have to keep information for a specific period of time) or accepted business practice. This is set out in our retention schedule.

What rights you have

Under Data Protection Legislation you have the following rights:

• Right of access (to receive a copy of your personal data)
• Right to rectification (to request data is corrected if it is inaccurate)
• Right to erasure (to request that data is deleted)
• Right to restrict processing (to request we don’t use your data in a certain way)
• Right to data portability (in some cases, you can ask to receive a copy of your data in a commonly-used electronic format so that it can be given to someone else)
• Right to object (generally to make a complaint about any aspect of our use of your data)
• Right to have explained if there will be any automated decision-making, including profiling, based on your data and for the logic behind this to be explained to you.

Any such request can be submitted to the Data Protection Officer. Whether we can agree to your request will depend on the specific circumstances and if we cannot then we will explain the reasons why.

If you are unhappy with any aspect of how your information has been collected and/or used, you can make a complaint to the Data Protection Officer.

You can also report your concerns to the Information Commissioner’s Office.