Data Protection, Freedom of Information and making requests for your data

How to make Freedom of Information request

Read about the Freedom of Information Act and how to make a request
Make a new request by contacting us using the details below

FOIA Manager
Judicial Appointments Commission
5th Floor
70 Petty France
London
SW1H 9EX
United Kingdom FOIA@judicialappointments.gov.uk

Requests for personal data

This privacy notice sets out the standards that you can expect from the Judicial Appointments Commission:

when we request or hold personal information (personal data) about you
how you can get access to a copy of your personal data
what you can do if you think the standards are not being met

The Judicial Appointments Commission is the data controller for the personal information we hold – this means that we collect and process personal data for use in our own and associated public functions. These include:

assessing your application for the judicial role you are applying for
communicating with you to notify you of progress in your application
communicating with you for news of the our business (where you have requested this)
communicating news of upcoming vacancies (where you have requested this)

About personal information

Personal data is information about you as an individual including your name, address, email address and telephone number. It can also include information about your career history, criminal record, professional conduct, financial and tax information and diversity information.

We know how important it is to protect your privacy and to comply with data protection laws. We will safeguard your personal data and will only disclose it where it is lawful to do so, or with your consent.

Types of personal data we process for communicating with you about business and vacancies

We only collect personal data that is relevant for the services we provide to you. This might include:

name
email address
phone number

Types of personal data we process for assessing and progressing your application for judicial appointment

We only process personal data that is relevant for the services we provide to you. This might include:

name
date of birth
email address
National Insurance Number
address
telephone numbers
IP address
citizenship
education history
career history
criminal record
information about character, such as criminal offences, insolvency proceedings, tax proceedings, professional negligence, professional misconduct

With your permission we might also collect diversity information, including your professional background, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, age, disability and belief or religion.

As part of the selection process, we might ask for additional information from your independent assessors.

As part of your access to the website and online application system, we might collect information about your browser, device, timestamp, traffic data, location, IP address and user journey.

Why we collect personal data

The purpose of collecting your personal data is to validate your application for a judicial position as set out in the Constitutional Reform Act 2005, specifically sections 63 and 64 which outline the JAC’s statutory obligations.

With your consent, we will collect personal information via our website which will be used for diversity monitoring purposes.

With your consent, we will collect personal data (limited to that outlined above) so we are able to send you vacancy alerts and newsletters.

Sharing information

We sometimes need to share the personal information we process with the individual themselves and also with other organisations. Where this is necessary we will comply with all aspects of the data protection laws. The organisations we share some aspects of your personal information with might include:

statutory consultation – the judiciary
independent assessors (provided by you)
professional bodies for conduct verification
HMRC for tax and financial information
ACRO Criminal Records Office for criminal record checks
professional regulatory bodies
following recommendation for appointment information is shared with Judicial Office and Judicial College

Details of transfers to third country and safeguards

We don’t transfer data to other countries.

Retention period

Information related to judicial appointments is currently retained for a maximum of 5 years.

Information related to the provision of newsletters is retained until a user requests to no longer receive the newsletter

When we ask you for personal data

We will only ask for the personal data we need to assess your application and to monitor the fairness of our processes. We will not collect information that is irrelevant or excessive. When we have your personal data, we will:

protect it and make sure no unauthorised person has access to it
share it with other organisations for legitimate purposes only where appropriate and necessary
make sure we don’t keep it longer than is necessary
not make your personal data available for commercial use without your consent
consider your request to correct, stop processing or erase your personal data

You can withdraw consent at any time, and where relevant, you can lodge a complaint with the supervisory authority, the Information Commissioner’s Office.

Information is available about:

agreements we have with other organisations for sharing information
circumstances where we can pass on personal information without telling you, for example, to help with the prevention or detection of crime or to produce anonymised statistics
our instructions to staff on how to collect, use or delete your personal information;
how we check that the information we hold is accurate and up-to-date
how to make a complaint

You can write to Data Protection Officer, by email at FOIA@judicialappointments.gov.uk

Or you can write to us by post at:

Judicial Appointments Commission, Clive House, 70 Petty France, London, SW1H 9EX

Please note it will take us longer to acknowledge posted request.

Access to personal information

You can find out if we hold any personal data about you by making a Subject Access Request (SAR). Under the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) you have the right to be told (when you ask) if we are is processing your data and what we do with it, as well as a copy of the data itself.

We have an exemption relating to data about judicial appointments that has carried over from the Data Protection Act 1998 to the GDPR provisions.

To make a subject access request you can write to Subject Access Request Officer, by email at FOIA@judicialappointments.gov.uk