Designated Officers

It is recommended that each partnership and partner nominate a designated officer to oversee the information-sharing process. Designated officer(s) should be fully aware of their duties and obligations under relevant legislation.

They should be responsible for:

• Data Protection (subject access) issues

• ensuring the confidentiality of information at all stages

• ensuring the security of information at all times

• ensuring compliance with legislation and

  • that a request or disclosure is legal and common law provisions permitting disclosure are adhered to.

  • checking that the partner or agency is named and that the exchange is necessary to fulfil a clearly specified role or objective, outlined in the Crime and Disorder Strategy or Youth Justice Plan.

  • checking that an appropriate Information Sharing Protocol exists and it's terms and conditions will be complied with.

  • making or approving a request for information in writing.

  • controlling the release of information.

  • ensuring that any data exchanged is accurate.

  • ensuring that information is only sent to and received by an authorised individual or agency.

  • where necessary, providing written consent for a secondary disclosure of information originally held by them to a third agency.

• auditing and monitoring exchanges

• dealing with complaints

There is no legal requirement, as to who should fulfil this role, although decisions in police forces are generally made at Inspector level. Other partners would normally be expected to authorise requests for information and approve disclosures at a supervisory or management level. The number of individuals, who should be designated for this role, will depend on the size of the organisation and the frequency with which information is exchanged. It should be recognised that the role of crime reduction agencies, often requires prompt exchanges. Partners should ensure that sufficient resources and priority is devoted to achieving this, wherever possible.

Some organisations require requests or releases of information to be countersigned. There may be sound internal reasons for this, although there is no legal obligation to do so and careful consideration should be given as to whether this is necessary or unduly bureaucratic.

Data Protection Officers will normally assume a leading role here. Some partners have proposed changing the role of the Data Protection Officer to include responsibility for information sharing (although in many instances Data Protection officers would already either directly or indirectly perform this function). A number have also recommended a change of job title to Information Officer, to reflect these new responsibilities.

The new role would place equal responsibility on the officer to ensure that information is shared in a legal and proper manner where this is necessary to meet a crime and disorder objective.

This is intended to make use of the Data Protection Officer's knowledge and expertise and in some instances to remove the perception that the Data Protection Officer's primary function was to prevent or discourage information from being shared. The information/data protection officer should be approachable and staff should be encouraged to ask questions if they have any doubts concerning the procedure or legality of an exchange.

Public Sector Partners who decide to adopt this approach should take care to avoid confusion with any individual with separate responsibility for implementing the Freedom of Information Act.