Torfaen Young People's Primary Counselling Service Privacy Policy

Cwmbran Centre for Young People
Counselling Service Manager - Email: ceri.jones@ccyp.org.uk - Tel: 0780 1550582
Primary Counselling Coordinator - Email: oliver.wilford@ccyp.org.uk

Any of your child’s personal data provided by you, or by other adults for example: school staff, to the Torfaen Young People’s Counselling Service through any means (verbal, written, in electronic form) will be held and processed in accordance with the data protection principles set out in the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR), in order for us to provide counselling as requested.

Introduction

The Torfaen Young People’s Counselling Service is committed to respecting your child’s Privacy and upholding the requirements of the General Data Protection Regulations.

If you have any questions about your child’s personal information or any questions about our use of the information, please ask the Primary Coordinator, Oliver Wilford, or contact the Service Manager, Ceri Jones, whose email and mobile number are at the top of this policy. When you (or someone else) request counselling for your child, you will be asked to consent to the counselling, and you will be asked to consent to our processing of your data under the terms of this policy.

What information do we collect?

Counselling Request Forms– Requesting access to our counselling service can be on paper, via email or in person. Our request process involves providing us with your child’s name, date of birth, address, and best contact number for you. We will also request information concerning therapeutic issues, and other details which we consider necessary for processing your request.
Personal Information- We are required by the Welsh Government to record statistical information such as: ethnic background, beliefs and disabilities- all of this information is recorded anonymously on a form that does not have your child’s name on.
Counselling session records- after each session, the counsellor will write down a brief outline of what your child talked about or what happened in the session. Session records do not contain everything your child said or did: they are a memory aid for the counsellor and to track any progress/change in your child’s response to counselling. You can ask the counsellor to show you these notes.
Initial Assessment– During the initial assessment (first appointment) the counsellor will talk to you and your child to get a fuller picture of what is going on for your child. For example: how they are at school, at home; and any other information relevant to understanding the situation. We need this information to decide if counselling is the right kind of support for your child, and to help focus the counselling sessions.
Risk and Child Protection- If your child’s counsellor is concerned that your child, or someone that they talk about is at risk, they will speak to the Child Protection Officer at the School, and they will record in the session notes any concerns and who they spoke to.

What do we use your child’s information for?

To provide young people with the professional counselling service requested from us.
To keep brief, appropriate notes in accordance with the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy Ethical Guidelines.
To notify you about changes to your child’s appointments and other changes to our service.
To improve our service and to ensure that it is provided in the most effective manner.
To report anonymised statistics about the Counselling Service to Welsh Government.

What information do we share?

We will not share any information about your child with other organisations or people, except in the following situations:

Consent – Your Counsellor may share your information with teachers, other professionals, parents/carers or other adults, if you have requested this or directly agreed to this, or if your child has asked them to speak to someone on their behalf.
Serious harm – Your Counsellor will share information with Child Protection Officers, if they are concerned that your child might be at risk of serious harm.
Compliance with law – We have to share information, including counselling session records, if we receive an order from the courts to do so.

How do we keep your child’s information safe?

All information you provide us with is stored as securely as possible. All paper forms, correspondence and counselling session records are kept in locked filing cabinets in locked rooms.

Sometimes we receive counselling requests via email and this can never be guaranteed to be 100% safe. However, we will do our best to protect your and your child’s information by using secure email providers and deleting electronic counselling requests once the request has been processed: once it has been securely filed or passed on to the appropriate counsellor.

Counselling records are taken to The Civic Centre in Pontypool at the end of the Academic year to be archived, and only the Service Manager and Primary Coordinator have access to these archived documents.

The archived notes are currently stored for 10 years after your child turns 18. This storage time may be updated at a future time.

Your rights

You have the right to ask us to provide a copy of the information held by us; and you have the right to ask us to correct any inaccuracies in the information we have. If you would like to do this, please speak to your child’s counsellor, Oliver Wilford, or contact the Service Manager, Ceri Jones. You may withdraw your consent for us to hold and process your child’s data at any time; however, if you do this while your child is receiving counselling, the counselling will have to end.

Last Modified: 20/07/2022 Back to top