GDPR

Angel Chambers – Privacy Notice

Who we are.

Please read the following information carefully. This privacy notice contains information about what data we collect and store about you and why. It also tells you who we share this information with, the security mechanisms we have put in place to protect your data and how to contact us if you have a complaint. 

Angel Chambers provides legal services according to instructions received from professional clients such as a solicitor (“the professional client”) and/or lay clients (“the client”). Your barrister collects and uses personal information about you so that he can provide legal services to you. This means that he is a “data ‘controller” along with any instructed Barrister, Mediator or Arbitrator, of this information for the purposes of the General Data Protection Regulation and other applicable Data Protection Act 2018

Angel Chambers(“Chambers”) is based in Ethos Building Kings Road Swansea SA1 8AS | Adeilad Ethos Heol Y Brenin Abertawe SA1 8AS

If you have any queries or need to contact either of them about your information or the processing carried out, you can use the contact details at the end of this document. Chambers will forward all relevant enquiries to your barrister.

What personal information is collected?

The information you provide to your barrister or which is collected by him will inevitably include some personal information. The GDPR says that personal data is information about:

  1. personal details
  2. family details
  3. lifestyle and social circumstances
  4. goods and services
  5. financial details
  6. education, training and employment details
  7. physical or mental health details
  8. racial or ethnic origin
  9. political opinions
  10. religious, philosophical or other beliefs
  11. trade union membership
  12. sex life or sexual orientation
  13. genetic information
  14. biometric information for the purpose of uniquely identifying a natural person
  15. criminal proceedings, outcomes and sentences, or related security measures
  16. other personal information relevant to instructions to provide legal services, including information specific to the instructions in question.

Sources of information
Personal information will normally come from you (or the professional client). However, sometimes it may come from other parties concerned in the matter in which your barrister is instructed. Such other parties may be other solicitors or legal professionals, experts, including medical and health care workers, witnesses or potential witnesses, friends or family members, police, prosecution and investigatory, regulatory or local authorities, courts and tribunals, or public sources such as the press, the internet, public registers and law reports.  If there are complaints, it may come from the Head of Chambers, other members of Chambers who deal with complaints, the Bar Standards Board, and/or the Legal Ombudsman.

Why and how is your personal information used?
Your barrister will use your personal information as permitted by the data protection legislation and this Privacy Notice

  • to provide the legal services requested, and/or
  • to discharge professional and/or contractual obligations towards the professional and lay client and/or
  • to fulfil regulatory requirements and/or
  • to respond to and defend against complaints and/or
  • as otherwise required by law such as complying with orders or directions of courts, or investigations by Legal Services Ombudsman, the Bar Standards Board, the Information Commissioner’s Office, or any other statutory regulators.

Chambers will process and use information for its legitimate interests such maintaining your barrister’s professional diary, checking for potential conflicts of interest, defending against complaints, legal proceedings, fee disputes or recovery, and complying with its professional obligations as required by the Bar Standards Board. Chambers may also process your information by providing secure digital or other storage and computing facilities to your barrister.

The legal basis for processing your personal information
Your barrister and Chambers will use the information where it is necessary for legal proceedings, providing legal advice or otherwise necessary for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal rights. The legal basis for the use or processing of the information is that it is necessary:

  • to perform the legal services requested by the professional client and /or client, and/or
  • to establish, exercise or defend legal claims or proceedings for or against the client including advising in respect of such of such matters or potential matters and/or
  • as regards retention for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims, to permit your barrister and Chambers to defend themselves in respect of potential complaints or legal proceedings;
  • to comply with legal and professional obligations such as complying with court directions or investigations by statutory regulators such as the Legal Services Ombudsman, the Bar Standards Board, or the Information Commissioner’s Office, and/or
  • to meet your barrister’s or Chambers’ legitimate interests such as checking for conflicts of interest, use in defending against complaints or potential complaints,  legal proceedings, fee disputes or recovery, and/or for complying with our professional obligations as required by the Bar Standards Board

Who might share your personal information?
Your personal information will be kept securely and treated confidentially. It will not be shared with others except where it is necessary to provide legal services in accordance with your instructions and/or professional obligations and legal requirements. For those purposes, personal information might be shared with

  • you and the professional client;
  • other persons instructed by the professional client (or if you are a Direct Access client, instructed by the client or your barrister), including other barristers, legal professionals, and experts;
  • if instructed and authorised to do so, witnesses and potential witnesses;
  • if instructed to do so, representatives of other parties to proceedings, police or regulatory or investigatory authorities;
  • Chambers information processors, such as IT support staff, email providers, information storage providers for the purpose of storing your information securely e.g. on secure computer systems;
  • Chambers’ staff for the purpose of securely receiving and communicating information on behalf of your barrister;
  • in the event of complaints, the Head of Chambers, members of Chambers who deal with complaints, the Bar Standards Board and the Legal Ombudsman;
  • as required by law before and during legal proceedings or as required by order or direction of a court.

Sensitive Personal Data
Chambers may also be required to provide your information to regulators, such as the Bar Standards Board, the Financial Conduct Authority or the Information Commissioner’s Office. In the case of the Information Commissioner’s Office, there is a risk that your information may lawfully be disclosed by them for the purpose of civil or criminal proceedings, without Chambers’ consent or your consent, which includes privileged information.

Chambers may also be required to disclose your information to the police or intelligence services, if required and permitted by law. 

Transfer of your information outside the European Economic Area (EEA)
Chambers does not normally transfer material outside the EEA. However, it would not be right to state that it never happens. This section deals with that possibility.

Transfer of information to countries outside the EEA is inevitable if you reside outside the EEA, or if your case involves persons or organisations or courts and tribunals in a country outside the EEA or if the instructions you provide come from outside the EEA.  If this applies to you and you wish additional precautions to be taken in respect of your information please indicate this when providing initial instructions.

Some countries and organisations outside the EEA have been assessed by the European Commission and their information protection laws and procedures have been found to show adequate protection. The list can be found here. Most do not. If your information has to be transferred outside the EEA, then it may not have the same protections and you may not have the same rights as you would within the EEA.

How long will your personal information be stored?
Your barrister will store your information while proceedings relating to the case are current or outstanding. When all proceedings and related matters have been resolved, no personal information will be retained for longer than is reasonably necessary or for reasons incompatible with data protection legislation including the GDPR and the requirements of regulatory bodies such as the Bar Council and the Bar Standards Board.

The professional client should retain copies of the material sent to your barrister, so most of that material will be returned to the professional client, or deleted or securely destroyed according to their instructions. Notes and working papers and any other material will be retained for 7 years (the retention period) from the date the end of the case (e.g. when the proceedings have ended and any applicable rights of appeal have been exhausted, or in the case of advisory work, no further advice is required).

That period may be renewed (i.e. start afresh) where any enquiry, issue or complaint is made within the retention period (e.g. by you, or the Court of Appeal, or the Criminal Cases Review Commission or any regulatory authority).

At the end of the retention period, your barrister will decide whether the information should be retained for a further period (e.g. because future enquiries, issues or complaints are anticipated).The decision to hold information beyond the retention period shall be reviewed annually.

Information not required to be retained shall be disposed of securely.

Some personal data will be retained for longer that the retention period where it is stored, for example, together with notes on other cases where retention period has not expired and it is not reasonable or proportionate to separate the personal information relating to one case from another. It is likely that your name, the professional client’s name and contact information which appears in your barrister’s professional appointments diary and fee records will be stored indefinitely as those records are required for conflict checking and tax or revenue purposes.

Data Security
Chambers and your barrister take the security of personal information seriously and we have the appropriate measures, safeguards and policies in place to make sure that data is kept secure and is only accessed by those people who have a legitimate need to access it and are authorised to do so. Appropriate and reasonable steps are in place to reduce the risk of unauthorised access (either through accidental disclosure, theft or otherwise) and in line with our policies and our obligations under the relevant data protection legislation, including the GDPR.

Your Rights
Under the GDPR, you have a number of rights that you can exercise subject to the conditions and restrictions set out in the GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018.  These rights can be exercised free of charge. In summary, you may have the right to:

  • Ask for access to your personal information and other supplementary information;
  • Ask for correction of mistakes in your information or to complete missing information Chambers holds on you;
  • Ask for your personal information to be erased, in certain circumstances;
  • Receive a copy of the personal information you have provided or have it sent to a third party. This will be provided to you or the third party in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format, e.g. a Word file;
  • Object at any time to processing of your personal information for direct marketing;
  • Object in certain other situations to the continued processing of your personal information;
  • Restrict the processing of your personal information in certain circumstances.

If you want more information about your rights under the GDPR please see the Guidance from the Information Commissioners Office on Individual's rights under the GDPR.  

If you want to exercise any of these rights, please:

  • Use the contact details at the end of this document;
  • Chambers may need to ask you to provide other information so that you can be identified;
  • Please provide a contact address so that you can be contacted to request further information to verify your identity;
  • Provide proof of your identity and address;
  • State the right or rights that you wish to exercise.

Chambers will respond to you within one month from when it receives your request.

How and where to make a complaint?

We hope that we can resolve any issues or complaints if they arise. If you have a complaint about your personal data or this Privacy Notice, please email us at [EMAIL] or write to the Senior Clerk at the address provided below.

If you are not satisfied with the result of any compliant you make to us, the GDPR also gives you the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioners’ Office if you are in the UK, or with the supervisory authority of the Member State where you work, normally live or where the alleged infringement of information protection laws occurred. The Information Commissioner’s Office can be contacted at http://ico.org.uk/concerns/ or can be written to at Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF.

Future Processing
Chambers does not intend to process your personal information except for the reasons stated within this privacy notice. If this changes, this privacy notice will be amended and placed on the Chambers’ website at http://www.angelchambers.co.uk/

Changes to this privacy notice
This privacy notice was published on 25 May 2018 and has not been updated since then.

Chambers continually reviews its privacy practices and may change this policy from time to time. When it does an amended privacy notice will be placed on the Chambers’ website at http://www.angelchambers.co.uk/

Contact Details
If you have any questions about this privacy notice or the information Chambers holds about you, please contact Chambers using the contact details below.

The best way to contact Chambers is to email: gill.heinrich@angelchambers.co.uk.

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