Guidance

Homelessness and rough sleeping research: privacy notice

Updated 17 April 2024

Applies to England

The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) is committed to improve our understanding of what works to prevent and tackle homelessness and rough sleeping.

To achieve this goal, the new ’Ending Rough Sleeping for Good’ strategy announced two initiatives: a £12 million Test & Learn Programme to accelerate the diffusion of both innovation and proven good practice, and a £2.2 million evaluation of the statutory homelessness system.

DLUHC has commissioned the Centre for Homelessness Impact to undertake a feasibility study for the proposed Test & Learn Programme, while Alma Economics will be scoping options for the evaluation of the homelessness system.

This privacy notice sets out how DLUHC (as data controller) and their processors use your personal information, in relation to this research. DLUHC will always take appropriate account of the requirement to meet its data protection obligations, as set out in this privacy notice.

If you have any concerns about how DLUHC is handling your personal information, you can email the department’s Data Protection Officer at: dataprotection@levellingup.gov.uk.

Or contact us at the following address:

DLUHC Data Protection Officer
2 Marsham Street
London
SW1P 4DF

1. What’s the aim of the research?

This research is being carried out by Centre for Homelessness Impact (CHI) and Alma Economics on behalf of the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) and will improve our ability to carry out our public functions – in this case to reduce homelessness. DLUHC is the data controller for this research and CHI and Alma Economics are data processors.

We want to collect information from different sources to improve our understanding of what works to prevent and reduce homelessness and rough sleeping.

By carrying out this research, DLUHC aims to:

1. The System-wide evaluation aims to provide contextual information to better understand delivery at the system and at the local level; providing a broader understanding of how the system works as a whole.

2. To provide a better understanding of how people enter and move through the homelessness and rough sleeping system, and interact with the different services.

3. To measure delivery and interventions using a common set of metrics, in order to understand the effectiveness  of the HRS system and service delivery, and what delivers the best value for money.

4. The Test and Learn Programme of work will aim to improve outcomes by focusing on gaining a better understanding of ‘what works’, for who, where, why, and in what context.

5. This will extend across the HRS system, and will include identifying, implementing, evaluating, and scaling effective practice.

6. Facilitate knowledge sharing and support capability building for local leaders and practitioners, with the aim of advancing the understanding and use of evidence to improve services

2. What personal information are we collecting and what will we do with it?

Personal data is defined under UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) as ‘any information relating to an identified or identifiable natural person’ – where ‘an identifiable natural person is one who can be identified, directly or indirectly, in particular by reference to an identifier such as a name, an identification number, location data, an online identifier or to one or more factors specific to the physical, physiological, genetic, mental, economic, cultural or social identity of that natural person’.

1. For this project, we (or our processors) will collect contact details – including your name, title, organisation, email address, phone number, and postal address;

2. Your interactions with us and our processors – for example if you send  information via email, or survey, this may be stored on our/ our processors systems;

3. Location data – where a survey is completed online we or our processors may collect your IP address;

Where applicable, we may also collect other data from you, as part of surveys interviews or focus groups. This may include your age, gender, nationality, ethnicity, etc. This data will only be collected from you directly and will be collected and processed in a way that they cannot be directly connected to you.

We may also collect, or instruct our processors, to collect:

• voice and/or audio recordings of your contribution (where applicable, you will have the option to opt out of this in the consent form)
• automated transcription of your contribution (where applicable, you will have the option to opt out of this in the consent form)
• your personal experiences and views regarding the HRS system (to the extent that you are happy to discuss those).

Where this occurs your view, recordings and responses will be stored separately from your personal details so you cannot be identified from this information. This will only be collected where required to answer research questions, and further details will be provided before you are asked to supply this information.

3. How we get the personal information and why we have it

The personal data we process is provided to us by local authorities to administer relevant funds and to carry out this research project. It may also be provided to us if you have expressed an interest in providing feedback in your experiences.  Further information may be gathered directly from you during surveys, workshops and/or interviews if you agree to this.

The personal data is processed on our behalf by our research contractors; The Centre for Homelessness Impact (CHI) and Alma Economics. They may use this information to contact you about further research and to understand more about the homelessness system and services.

4. What is the lawful basis for processing your data?

Under the UK GDPR, the lawful bases we rely on for processing this information are:

Article 6(1)(e) - processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller.

5. How we store your personal information

Your personal data will not be sent outside of the EU: it will be securely stored in the UK or EU by DLUHC and its processors.

CHI and Alma Economics (DLUHC’s third party processors) will keep your personal data and store them securely for a maximum of three months after their contracts end (anticipated to be April 2023) if their contracts are extended the storage time will be extended in line with this. DLUHC may keep contact details and interview and focus group transcripts longer to enable the continuation of this research, which is due to end in 2025. To ensure we don’t retain the data for longer than is necessary, we will carry out a review every year. If a decision is taken that the data is no longer needed for the research your personal data will be securely deleted.

DLUHC will only use your data within the terms of data protection laws, will delete your data securely and only keep it for as long as necessary for our work as a public body. DLUHC will review dates for keeping personal details and data in the future. Where relevant, some data may be kept without personal details attached (e.g. survey results) for longer periods.

Data security and anonymity is of high importance to this project. All data will be transferred between organisations using secure transfer methods. Strict security procedures will be agreed and put in place for each organisation involved in the project.

6. What will happen to the results of this research?

Only aggregate level results of this research will be published, e.g. DLUHC will publish reports on the gov.uk website. You will not be identified in any research report.

7. Automated decision making

DLUHC will not use your data for automated decision making, e.g. using statistical modelling to decide whether or not to provide services.

8. What are my rights?

You have the right to object to the use of your personal data, the right to see the personal details held (name, address etc) and the right for it to be changed if it is wrong. You also have the right to ask us to restrict the processing of your personal data in certain circumstances. If you would like to exercise these rights, please contact DLUHC’s Data Protection Officer at dataprotection@levellingup.gov.uk or at the below postal address:

DLUHC Data Protection Officer
2 Marsham Street
London
SW1P 4DF

9. What if I want to complain or find out more information?

If you want more information you can ask a member of staff at your local authority and/or contact DLUHC researchers at HRSresearch@levellingup.gov.uk.

You can contact DLUHC’s Knowledge and Information Team to request access to or correction of your data by emailing DLUHC’s Data Protection Officer at dataprotection@levellingup.gov.uk.

If you are unhappy with the way your personal data is being handled you can contact the independent Information Commissioner at:

ico.org.uk/livechat

Helpline number 0303 123 1113.