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Citizenship privacy notice

Who we are

Kent County Council collects, uses and is responsible for certain personal information about you. When we do so we are regulated under the General Data Protection Regulation which applies across the European Union (including in the United Kingdom) and we are responsible as ‘controller’ of that personal information for the purposes of those laws. Our Data Protection Officer is Benjamin Watts.

Personal information we collect and use

Information collected by us

The Home Office send naturalisation certificates to the Register Office for each individual, successful new citizen.

The information provided by the Home Office will be held and processed by registration officers for the registration district.

Information held includes the following:

  • poll date
  • Home Office reference number
  • lead case identifier
  • full name
  • poll number
  • certificate number
  • address
  • date of birth
  • country of origin
  • telephone number
  • email address.

How long your personal data will be kept

We will hold your personal information for:

  • personal details are held for 2 years following the ceremony date.

Reasons we can collect and use your personal information

We rely on processing being necessary for compliance with a legal obligation to which the data controller is subject as the lawful basis on which we collect and use your personal data.

Who we share your personal information with

The Home Office to confirm attendance of a ceremony.

Data is shared with Electoral Registration Officers.

Data can be shared with other Kent County Council services if requested.

We will share personal information with law enforcement or other authorities if required by applicable law.

Your Rights

Under the GDPR you have a number of rights which you can access free of charge which allow you to:

  • know what we are doing with your information and why we are doing it
  • ask to see what information we hold about you
  • ask us to correct any mistakes in the information we hold about you
  • object to direct marketing
  • make a complaint to the Information Commissioners Office.

Depending on our reason for using your information you may also be entitled to:

  • ask us to delete information we hold about you
  • have your information transferred electronically to yourself or to another organisation
  • object to decisions being made that significantly affect you
  • object to how we are using your information
  • stop us using your information in certain ways.

We will always seek to comply with your request however we may be required to hold or use your information to comply with legal duties. Please note: your request may delay or prevent us delivering a service to you.

For further information about your rights, including the circumstances in which they apply, see the guidance from the UK Information Commissioners Office (ICO) on individuals’ rights under the General Data Protection Regulation.

If you would like to exercise a right, please contact the Information Resilience and Transparency Team at data.protection@kent.gov.uk.

Keeping your personal information secure

We have appropriate security measures in place to prevent personal information from being accidentally lost, or used or accessed in an unauthorised way. We limit access to your personal information to those who have a genuine business need to know it. Those processing your information will do so only in an authorised manner and are subject to a duty of confidentiality.

We also have procedures in place to deal with any suspected data security breach. We will notify you and any applicable regulator of a suspected data security breach where we are legally required to do so.

Who to contact

Please contact the Information Resilience and Transparency Team at data.protection@kent.gov.uk to exercise any of your rights, or if you have a complaint about why your information has been collected, how it has been used or how long we have kept it for.

The superintendent registrar is a data controller for citizenship data and can be contacted at The Archbishops Palace, Mill Street, Maidstone ME15 6YE.

The Home Office can be contacted at Department 1, UK Visas and Immigration, The Capital Building, New Hall Place, Liverpool, L3 9PP.

You can contact our Data Protection Officer, Benjamin Watts, County Hall, Sessions House, Maidstone, ME14 1XQ or at dpo@kent.gov.uk.

The General Data Protection Regulation also gives you right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority. The supervisory authority in the UK is the Information Commissioner who may be contacted at https://ico.org.uk/concerns or telephone 03031 231113.

For further information read our main privacy statement.