Noise and nuisance privacy notice

The service has the responsibility for investigating complaints about noise and nuisance

If you have questions regarding this service or our privacy practices, you can contact us by email or in writing. Email environmentalhealth@walthamforest.gov.uk for more information.

You can also contact us by post. Please write to:

Air Quality and Environmental Protection Service
Waltham Forest Town Hall
Forest Road
Walthamstow, E17 4JF

Please note that face-to-face meetings are by appointment only and can be arranged with the service by email.

Where relevant to do so and appropriate we may process the following information about you:

• Name and contact details
• Gender
• Social and lifestyle circumstances
• Family details
• Personal appearance and behavioural details
• In cases where we use noise monitoring equipment, there may be recordings of sounds, including voices, from within your property or neighbouring properties

We may also process the following special category data about you:

• Racial and ethnic origin
• Criminal offences (including alleged offences)

The processing and use of your personal data are primarily required to fulfil our legal and statutory obligations, in particular in relation to the Environmental Protection Act 1990, but also in relation to the Antisocial Behaviour Crime and Policing Act 2014, in order us to deal with noise and nuisance issues, and where relevant, in order to tackle antisocial behaviour.

We consider your privacy with great importance and will only use your personal information to:

• record, investigate and resolve complaints of noise, nuisance and antisocial behaviour
• support civil and criminal law action
• inform you about our services
• provide services you have requested from us
• enable us to carry out specific functions for which we are responsible
• derive statistics that inform decisions such as the allocation of resources
• assess performance and to set targets for the Council and for service planning or improvement to develop service delivery

If we use the information for research purposes this will be anonymised data only and may assist us to improve our performance and delivery of services in the future.

We will only ask for personal information that is appropriate and proportionate to enable us to deliver our services effectively. This is in accordance with legal obligations under the Environmental Protection Act 1990 and, where appropriate, the Antisocial Behaviour Crime and Policing Act 2014 to uphold the support, protection and fulfilment of our noise, nuisance functions.

In most cases, we will obtain your personal data directly from you, either on registration forms or when we communicate with you. We may receive personal data from a third-party agency with whom we have information-sharing agreements and protocols.

We will also advise you of our duty to disclose or if we envisage disclosing personal data to another party.

You reserve the right to refuse to provide your details if you deem the request to be inappropriate. Please remember that if we cannot use your data this may impact our ability to provide you with or make arrangements for services to assist your needs.

The lawful basis we rely on to collect and use your personal data under the GDPR is ‘Public Task’

It may be necessary for us to share personal data with both internal and external partners or agencies: The main services or organisations that we are likely to share information with are:

• The Council’s Antisocial Behaviour Service
• The Council’s Housing Department
• The Councils’ Legal Service
• County, Magistrates or Crown Courts
• Police
• Housing associations
• Advocacy services

Most of our records are retained for six years, unless they need to be retained for longer in connection with enforcement action. Recordings obtained using noise monitoring equipment are deleted after 12 months unless they need to be retained for longer in connection with enforcement action.