Right to erasure (right to be forgotten)

You can request that any personal information we hold about you is deleted or destroyed although we don’t always have to do so.  We will delete your personal information in the following circumstances:

• if it is no longer needed for the reason we collected it in the first place
• if you have previously given your consent and now withdraw it
• if you object to the processing in relation to automated decision making or profiling

In some circumstances, where services are provided online directly to children, for example social networking sites and internet forums, personal information must be deleted on request.  This might happen when an adult wants information deleted that they posted online as a child or young person because they didn’t realise the effect it would have on them when they got older. However, we do not process information about children in this way.

We can’t delete your personal information where:

• we need it by law to carry out a legal obligation
• we need to use it for one of our official functions
• it is needed for legal claims
• it is needed for the protection of public health
• it is needed for archiving, scientific or historical research or statistical purposes

Personal information used for journalism, academic, artistic or literary expression does not have to be deleted but we do not process information for those purposes.

Where possible we will pass your request on to anyone else we have shared your information with so they can delete the information they hold about you.

Before we delete your personal information, we will need to check your identity to make sure we are deleting the right person’s information. See right of access for details of the identity documents to provide.

If it is agreed that we will delete your personal information, we will take reasonable steps to delete all your information as soon as possible and within one month.

Page last reviewed: 18 November 2020