About your registration

We collect information from you when you register to use this site. This includes your email address and additional demographic information as provided by you on the registration form.  We need to collect your email address to help authenticate and verify who is engaging with us and to keep you updated on the progress of engagements or new engagements that you have expressed an interest in and have given your consent for us to contact you about.   

You can chose the demographic data that you wish to supply to us.  However, to help us ensure that we understand the needs of all our residents and meet our equality obligations, we encourage you to answer the demographic questions.   

You are able to browse any publicly accessible sections of this website completely anonymously without signing up.  However, for openness and transparency, if you wish to leave comments, share your ideas or stories or vote on others ideas and suggestions, you will need to register.   Please note: your user name only will be visible on the public website.   Usernames are submitted by participants during the registration process as a way to identify themselves in public facing activities.  

We only collect and use the minimum amount of personal information required when delivering a service to you.  The information that we collect about you is:

  • who you are responding as
  • where you live by postcode (SS) area only
  • email address

To ensure we have received a wide range of views from across the city and meet our equality obligations, we collect the following demographic information which includes some sensitive information about you called special category personal data.  These questions are optional and you do not have to answer them.  

  • age
  • gender
  • caring responsibilities
  • disability
  • ethnicity
  • national identity
  • sexual orientation

We collect this information to comply with our equality duties under Equalities Act 2010.  We may also use this information to engage proactively with particular equality groups or see if there are differing views between groups of people so that we can make more informed and equitable decisions.  

We may occasionally ask for the following information:

  • details about your lifestyle and social circumstances
  • employment and education details

Your information

We collect and use your information as part of our consultation and engagement processes.  We need this information to help us improve council services or inform council priorities and / or help improve the social, economic or environmental wellbeing of Southend.   

We collect and process this information in order to: 

  • analyse and interpret it to help meet our objectives and obligations;
  • communicate information to you about engagement opportunities, events and other initiatives; and
  • respond to enquiries and otherwise engage with stakeholders

We use your information for one or more of the following reasons:

  • To plan and improve the services we offer - council specific services, functions and priorities.
  • To research and plan how we might improve local quality of life or improve the social, economic or wellbeing of Southend - part of our responsibilities under community planning to lead and facilitate city and local neighbourhood improvements where we work with other statutory bodies and community planning partners.  
  • To evidence positive outcomes to central government or funding agencies

When we collect your views on a consultation, we may also ask if you would like to be:

  • contacted in the future about any updates in relation to the project or consultation you are submitting your views about
  • contacted about any future consultations related to the topic area that may be of interest to you
  • invited to attend an event or meeting related to the consultation or topic area
  • invited to participate in future engagement panels or focus groups
  • invited to register on our online engagement tool
  • invited to take part in a prize draw

The information we would collect for these purposes may include:

  • Full name
  • Email address
  • Telephone number

Surveys

Many of our surveys and polls will be anonymous.  When you respond to a survey that includes personal information, we will explain why we are seeking this information, how we will be use it and how we will protect your privacy.  All information that we collect through surveys are analysed and reported anonymously to protect your privacy.  

We also collect information about your usage of the site, such as pages visited, documents downloaded, etc.  This helps us determine how effective our engagement activities are and how well we are able to reach and engage with our residents generally.   

Sharing your information

We may produce summary reports or grouped data, in which individuals cannot be personally identified, and use these in published reports or internal report to inform strategic decisions or service reviews.

For some engagements, we may give external consultants access to your survey data as part of formal contracted support.  If we do need to share your personal information with an external consultant, we will tell you in a privacy notice before we collect it. 

Processing your information

The number of staff accessing and handling individual data is limited to a small number of authorised members of staff who are required to process it for the purposes outlined in our privacy notice. Our service provider Engagement HQ Ltd will have restricted access to the platform for the purposes of maintaining the system only.