This is not an official website of the House of Commons or the House of Lords. It has not been approved by either the House or its committees. All-Party Parliamentary Groups are informal groups of Members of both Houses with a common interest in particular issues. The views expressed in these webpages are those of the groups.

What is this Privacy Policy for?

This privacy policy sets out how user data will be stored, processed and protected through the www.policyconnect.org.uk website and associated email services, served by Policy Connect. It governs the privacy of the users of these websites and associated services. It sets out how Policy Connect, as the website owner, will store, process and use your data, and it sets out your obligations as the user. 

The Website

The owner of this website takes a proactive approach to user privacy and ensure the necessary steps are taken to protect the privacy of users throughout their visiting experience. This website complies with all UK national laws and requirements for user privacy.

Use of Cookies

[Website cookies notice]

This website uses cookies to better the users’ experience while visiting the website. Cookies are small files saved to the user's computer hard drive that track, save and store information about the user's interactions and usage of the website. This allows the user to have a more tailored experience within this website. Where applicable this website uses a cookie control system, to allow the user on their first visit to the website to allow or disallow the use of cookies on their computer / device. This complies with recent legislation requirements for websites to obtain explicit consent from users before leaving behind or reading files such as cookies on a user's computer / device.

Users are advised that if they wish to deny the use and saving of cookies from this website onto their computer’s hard drive they should take necessary steps within their web browsers security settings to block all cookies from this website and its external serving vendors.

This website uses tracking software to monitor its visitors’ browsing history to better understand how they use it. This software is provided by Google Analytics which uses cookies to track visitor usage. The software will save a cookie to your computer’s hard drive in order to track and monitor your engagement and usage of the website, but will not store, save or collect personal information. You can read Google's privacy policy here for further information: [http://www.google.com/privacy.html].

Other cookies may be stored to your computer’s hard drive by external vendors when this website uses referral programs, sponsored links or adverts. Such cookies are used for conversion and referral tracking and typically expire after 30 days, though some may take longer. No personal information is stored, saved or collected.

Contact & Communication with Policy Connect

Users contacting this Policy Connect directly or via this website do so at their own discretion and their consent is required for the provision of any personal details requested. .

Should you provide Policy Connect with personal information, it is kept private and stored securely until a time it is no longer required or has no use, as detailed in the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR).

To achieve this we:

  • Manage a single Policy Connect database, overseen by our Senior Management Team and data protection officer, the COO. 
  • Purchase or gather publically available data to manage with legititmate interest - only for single purpose business-to-business contact (for example an invitation to an event with relevant content to your interests).
  • We also require informed consent from individuals for inclusion on our long-term single database/mailing lists kept on Mailchimp; this consent is recorded.
  • Carry out information risk assessment and apply mitigation measures to keep data safe.
  • Provide GDPR training to all of our staff.
  • For newsletters and events we manage lists on MailChimp [Terms & Conditions] and Eventbrite [Terms of Service] which comply with GDPR regulations, including deleting data once its specific purpose expired (for example once an event has completed).
  • We also manage data collected by the website via Google Analytics. This third party service complies with GDPR requirements.
  • We manage our finances via Sage to comply with GDPR requirements and access to this is limited to our Finance Manager.
  • We manage our recruitment via Talentvine [Terms & Conditions] which comply with GDPR requirements.
  • We keep data up to date by regularly reviewing data lists and writing to contacts on an annual basis to ensure they wish to remain in contact with us.

Policy Connect uses your information for the following purposes:

  • To provide you with further information about the specific products / services we offer.
  • To assist you in answering any questions or queries you may have submitted.
  • To subscribe you to any email newsletter operated through the website, providing that this was made clear to you and your express permission was granted.
  • To invite you to Policy Connect-run events.

From time to time we may advertise events, meetings and information about our partners/members via the website because we think you will be interested in the content. 

We do not pass your data to our partners/members without express consent.

Code of Governance

Policy Connect's Code of Governance may be found here. 

Email Newsletters

This group of websites operates an email newsletter programme, used to inform subscribers about services supplied by Policy Connect. Users can subscribe through an online automated process should they wish to do so but do so at their own discretion/by opting in. Some subscriptions may be manually processed through prior written agreement with the user. If you wish to be removed from any (or all) mailing list/s, please unsubscribe via the latest email you received, or contact Policy Connect to ensure this is done manually.

Subscriptions are taken in compliance with UK Spam Laws detailed in the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003 and GDPR. All personal details relating to subscriptions are held securely and in accordance with the GDPR. No personal details are passed on to third parties or shared with companies / people outside of the organisation that operates this website.

Email marketing campaigns published by this website or its owners may contain tracking facilities within the actual email. Subscriber activity is tracked and stored in a database for future analysis and evaluation. Such tracked activity may include; the opening of emails, forwarding of emails, the clicking of links within the email content, times, dates and frequency of activity [this is not a comprehensive list]. This information is used to refine future email campaigns and supply the user with more relevant content based around their activity.

In compliance with UK Spam Laws and the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003 subscribers are given the opportunity to unsubscribe at any time through an automated system. This process is detailed at the footer of each email. If an automated un-subscription system is unavailable, clear instructions on how to unsubscribe will be detailed instead.

External Links

Although this website looks only to include quality, safe and relevant external links such as to partner organisations, despite their best efforts the owners of this website cannot guarantee the contents of any externally linked website. Users click on external links at their own risk and this website and its owners cannot be held liable for any damages or implications caused by visiting any external links mentioned.

Users are therefore advised to adopt a policy of caution before clicking any external web links mentioned throughout this website. (External links are clickable text / banner / image links to other websites).

Social Media Platforms

Communication, engagement and actions taken through external social media platforms that Policy Connect participate in conform to the terms and conditions as well as the privacy policies held with each social media platform respectively.

Users are advised to use social media platforms wisely and communicate / engage upon them with due care and caution in regard to their own privacy and personal details. Neither this website nor its owners will ever ask for personal or sensitive information through social media platforms, and encourage users wishing to discuss sensitive details to contact them through primary communication channels such as by telephone or email.

This website may use social sharing buttons which help share web content directly from web pages to the social media platform in question. Users are advised before using such social sharing buttons that they do so at their own discretion and note that the social media platform may track and save your request to share a web page respectively through your social media platform account.

Shortened Links in Social Media

Policy Connect, through their social media platform accounts, may share web links to relevant web pages. By default some social media platforms shorten lengthy urls [web addresses] (this is an example: http://bit.ly/zyVUBo). 

Users are advised to take caution and good judgement before clicking any shortened urls published on social media platforms by Policy Connect. Despite the best efforts to ensure only genuine urls are published many social media platforms are prone to spam and hacking and therefore Policy Connect cannot be held liable for any damages or implications caused by visiting any shortened links.

Recruitment

Solicited personal data 

Policy Connect collects personal data via the recruitment platform Talentvine for its recruitment purposes. This includes:

  • Personal data: CVs, telephone numbers, email addresses, names, addresses, names and contact details for referees
  • Sensitive data: racial or ethnic origin, political, religious or philosophical beliefs, health or sexual orientation

Policy Connect is committed to the aim of ensuring that everyone who applies to work here receives fair treatment. We are an equal opportunities employer and welcome applications from all suitably qualified individuals regardless of race, gender/expression, sex, disability, sexual orientation, religion or belief, age, marital status or civil partnership or pregnancy/parental leave.

We use Talentvine as a recruitment platform and also advertise roles via professional recruiters/recruitment websites, which redirect to the relevant role on the Talentvine application form. Talentvine and all recruitment websites supply their own privacy notices.

The above data will retained on our recruitment platform for six months after the job advertisement closes unless candidates have provided express consent to becoming part of our talent pool on Talentvine. Following this, data submitted by unsuccessful candidates will be deleted, and successful candidate data will be retained for employment purposes. Please view Talentvine's GDPR data management statement here.

Unsolicited personal data

Upon receipt of unsolicited personal data, such as a CV submitted on a speculative basis, Policy Connect will delete the data and inform the applicant of this. We notify the applicant or this deletion and encourage them to apply to an existing vacancy or register for our talent pool on the Talentvine platform and manage their data there.

Events

You will receive invitations because you have previously contacted Policy Connect, the event organisers, or your information is in the public domain and we believe the event is appropriate to your interests and network.

If you do not wish to be contacted by Policy Connect about this event in the future please email us on info [at] policyconnect.org.uk (info[at]policyconnect[dot]org[dot]uk). 

By RSVPing to an event Policy Connect has a ‘legitimate interest’ in managing your data. The data collected includes: name, job title and company, accessibility requirements, dietary requirements, email addresses.

Data is collected for the following activity associated with an event: advance event notifications and updates, attendee listings for our and our partner's event organising purposes (these will consist of name, job title and company only), and for name badges, social media updates and photography. We also provide data to our supplier, the Houses of Parliament, which requires visitor/attendee lists for security purposes, but also asks for any accessibility and dietary requirements so that these can be accommodated for. For APPGs guest lists must be declared on their website, as per All-Party Parliamentary Group rules, provided by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards.

Data is maintained for up to three months of the event having taken place during which time a final summary or event follow-up may be emailed out or posted on the website.

Resources & Further Information

Under the GDPR you may request a copy of personal information held about you. If you would like a copy of the information held on you please write to the business address at the bottom of this policy, info [at] policyconnect.org.uk (info[at]policyconnect[dot]org[dot]uk).

 

Policy Connect

7-14 Great Dover Street,

London,

SE2 0EH

info [at] policyconnect.org.uk (info[at]policyconnect[dot]org[dot]uk)