Planning - Privacy notice

Who we are and what we do

The council is a data controller under the Data Protection Legislation as we collect and process personal information about you in order to provide Planning services and meet our statutory obligations.

This notice explains why we ask for your personal information, how that information will be used and how you can access your records.

Any questions regarding our privacy practices should be sent to:

Data Protection Officer (DPO)
West Oxfordshire District Council
Council Offices, Witney, OX28 1NB
Email: data.protection@westoxon.gov.uk
Tel: 01993 861194

Why we need your information and how we use it

Planning and Development Management is a statutory function we provide in exercise of its powers and duties under the Town and Country Planning (Development Management Procedure) (England) Order 2015 and Town and Country Planning (Conservation Areas and Listed Buildings) Act 1990. We collect your information to process your application to:

Apply for Planning Permission, Listed Building Consent or Certificate of Lawfulness.
Submit an Appeal regarding your planning application decision
General enquires regarding Planning, Conservation Areas and Listed Building
Account registration on Public Access (to submit comments on planning applications and/or to follow developments on a planning application)
We also receive comments, representations, allegations and questions via email, letter and through our platforms. When making comments you must provide your name and address, both will be disclosed on our Public Access during the planning application process.
We might also use sensitive personal information, such as information about your physical health if it is relevant to your planning or building regulation application (for example, as evidence of exemption of a fee for a registered disabled person).

What type of information is collected from you

In order to administer our services we collect the following information from you:

name
address
email
telephone number
bank details
agent contact details (if applicable)
full address of the development

The council is required to publish planning applications on its website which includes applicant/agent name and address, however, we will redact personal information such as signatures, email addresses and telephone numbers.

We charge for Planning applications and will record payment amounts made, amounts outstanding and the action taken to recover monies owed.

Enforcement cases remain confidential and at no time will we divulge the details of complainants who have informed us of alleged planning breaches.

Generally, the information we hold will have been provided by you (on an application or enquiry form or when we communicate with you), but we may also hold information provided by third parties where this is relevant i.e. complainants, LGO, other council departments.

We will only ask for personal information that is appropriate to enable us to deliver our services. In some cases, you can refuse to provide your details if you deem a request to be inappropriate. However, you should note that this may impact on our ability to provide some services to you.

Who your information may be shared with (internally and externally)

We may share information you have provided, and obtain information about you from other council services such as Housing where held and only as appropriate.

We may share your information with external agencies such as the Planning Inspectorate or Local Government Ombudsman in the event of direct appeals or complaints.

We will not disclose any information to any company outside of the Council except to prevent fraud, or if required to do so by law.

How long we keep your information (retention period)

Planning decisions are kept in hard copy format for 6 months and then they are required to be published on our website and the information retained ad infinitum.

We securely destroy all financial information once we have used it and no longer need it

How we protect your information

We will not transfer your personal data outside the EU without your consent.

We have implemented generally accepted standards of technology and operational security in order to protect personal data from loss, misuse, or unauthorised alteration or destruction.

Please note however that where you are transmitting information to us over the internet this can never be guaranteed to be 100% secure.

For any payments which we take from you online we will use a recognised online secure payment system.

We will notify you promptly in the event of any breach of your personal data which might expose you to serious risk.

Your rights

You have rights under the Data Protection Legislations:

to access your personal data
to be provided with information about how your personal data is processed
to have your personal data corrected
to have your personal data erased in certain circumstances
to object to or restrict how your personal data is processed
to have your personal data transferred to yourself or to another business in certain circumstances
to be told if we have made a mistake whilst processing your data and we will self report breaches to the Commissioner.

How you can access, update or correct your information

The Data Protection Legislation allows you to find out what information is held about you, on paper and computer records. This is known as ‘right of subject access’ and applies to your Planning data along with all other personal records. For more information see our Data Protection webpage.

If you wish to see a copy of your records you should contact the Data Protection Officer. You are entitled to receive a copy of our records free of charge, within a month.

In certain circumstances access to your records may be limited, for example, if the records you have asked for contain information relating to another person.

The accuracy of your information is important to us to be able to provide relevant services more quickly. We are working to make our record keeping more efficient. In the meantime, if you change your address or email address, or if any of your circumstances change or any of the other information we hold is inaccurate or out of date, email us or write to us at:

Planning Services
West Oxfordshire District Council
Council Offices, Witney, OX28 1NB
Contact us

Further information

If you would like to know more about how we use your information or if for any reason you do not wish to have your information used, email data.protection@westoxon.gov.uk.

You can also complain to the Information Commissioner.

We reserve the right to update this privacy notice from time to time by publishing a new version here on our website.