How we use your information

We collect and process personal information about you when it is relevant to the family court proceedings. We do this in order to carry out our legal duties in providing advice to the court.

As well as information collected directly from you, other information we collect can include information provided by the court, the police, local authorities and health information. We hold this information where it is relevant to our statutory role.

The personal data we collect is used to make sure we deliver our services effectively this includes:

• Help us carry out our legal duties, especially our duties under the Children Act 2004;
• Prepare facts and figures to help us plan for the future;
• Respond to individual aspects of representation and / or the complaints we receive
• Assess how well we are performing our duties.

Our privacy notice sets out our reasons for processing, using and sharing your personal data.

The information we collect and use will not be published in ways which identify individuals but may be shared with third parties who are commissioned to assist us with research, consultations or evaluations of our work and/or its impact on the Family Justice system in Wales. Any such sharing of information will be managed in line with the Data Protection Act 2018.

The UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) gives you certain rights about the personal data we hold about you. You have the right: 

• to access the personal data that we are processing about you; 
• to require us to rectify inaccuracies in that data; 
• to object or to restrict (in certain circumstances) to processing; 
• for your data (in certain circumstances) to be ‘erased’; 
• to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) who is the independent regulator for data protection 

This process is explained in our factsheet Accessing your Personal Information: Data Subject Access Request

The Welsh Government is committed to handling your personal data safely, securely and only for as long as we need. 

If you have any concerns about how we use your personal data, we encourage you to raise them with the relevant team in the first instance. 

You can also contact the Data Protection Officer by emailing DataProtectionOfficer@gov.wales or writing to the DPO at: 

Welsh Government 
Cathays Park
Cardiff 
CF10 3NQ

If you wish to make a formal complaint about how the Welsh Government has processed your personal data, you can complain about Welsh Government.

We will acknowledge your complaint and respond within an appropriate timescale, in line with data protection legislation and our complaints process.