Privacy policy as of June 2019
This Fair Processing Notice tells you about processing of “personal data” by 5RB: 5RB Services Ltd (“Chambers”) and the various members of Chambers (“MoCs”).
Chambers is a data controller and each MoC is also a data controller in their own right.
Once a case has been allocated to a barrister they are the data controller for personal data relating to that case, and Chambers, through its employees, processes personal data on their behalf. Chambers is the data controller for unallocated cases, and for other personal data, such as data relating to employees and applicants to Chambers, as well as the 5RB mailing list.
To make things simpler, 5RB (and all of the MoCs) have agreed to centralise the handling of all requests or queries you might have about our processing of your personal data. The person to contact at 5RB is our Senior Clerk, Andrew Love, who can be reached at clerks@5rb.com or on 0207 242 2902. When making a request or query, please specify to which data controller your request or query is directed.
What data we collect and why
The data we process relating to cases we are involved in includes: names, contact details, dates of birth, financial information, passport scans, and events in your life which are relevant to litigation in which we are acting. This may include “special category” personal data including information about your medical history, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religious beliefs, trade union membership, genetic and biometric data, political opinions, and any other physical or mental health details. It may include information about criminal records, arrests, charges or allegations. All this personal data is held for the purposes of performing legal services for our clients (primarily legal advice, drafting, and advocacy), and for the establishment, exercise and defence of legal claims.
There are also times that 5RB collects and processes personal data that isn’t involved in our barristers providing legal services. For example, this may include recruitment (of staff, clerks, pupils or mini-pupils) or for 5RB marketing events such as our 5RB Conference. We will only process this information for as long as is necessary to do so (such as for the recruitment exercise), or for as long as we have your consent to do so.
Our lawful bases for processing personal data include:
- where you are party to a contract, or proposing to become party to a contract (such as by seeking to instruct a Member of Chambers, or to be employed by Chambers) and that (proposed) contract requires your personal data to be processed to a limited degree;
- where we may have legal obligations that mean we have to process personal data, including anti-money laundering obligations and proper record-keeping as required by the Bar Standards Board;
- where there is a public interest, including in the administration of justice;
- where you have given us your consent;
- where our clients have legitimate interests, such as the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims (or proposed legal claims). Or where you and/or 5RB/and or a Member of Chambers has legitimate interests, such as applying for and undertaking work experience with Chambers, or the handling of complaints.
How we may disclose personal data
We may need to disclose personal data to third parties. These may be:
- companies who process on our behalf (such as our IT providers) and only act upon our instructions.
- individuals and companies who are needed to provide other services or to whom we are required to disclose personal data by a court order or in connection with legal proceedings or to establish or defend legal rights such as: Judges, other lawyers, or HM Courts and Tribunals Service.
- regulators and the courts when we are required to do so.
- a pupil (trainee barrister) who is training with a barrister. Pupils are subject to obligations of confidentiality and under data protection law.
On rare occasions, we may need to transfer your personal data outside the European Union. We will, save for exceptional circumstances, only do so:
- to a country in the European Economic Area or that the European Commission has certified as having adequate data protection law; or
- for the establishment or defence of legal claims; or
- for fulfilling the terms of a contract with you.
We do not conduct any automated decision-making on personal data.
We will generally keep case data for as long as is necessary for the purposes set out above, and where the purposes comes to an end, for case data for at least 6 years thereafter, for the purposes of complaints, dealing with any resulting litigation and record-keeping. We will keep applicant data, for 2 years after the end of the recruitment exercise.
Our mailing list
5RB Services Ltd stores and processes the contact details of individuals who subscribe to our email update mailing list, and who have attended an event with us recently. We may use your personal data to provide you with marketing information and information about training (including notifying you of events, offers of services or legal developments which may be of interest to you), and for this purpose we may disclose your information to companies and organisations who provide marketing services to us.
You may unsubscribe from our mailing list at any time. Emails sent to addresses on our mailing list all contain an unsubscribe option at the bottom of the email. Clicking on this link will load a page which asks whether you wish to unsubscribe. If you click on the unsubscribe button your email address will be removed from the mailing list. Alternatively you may contact our clerks at any time at clerks@5rb.com.
Your Rights
You have various legal rights in your personal data including the right of: information and access to your data, including a “portable” copy of your data; erasure and rectification of your data; and rights to restrict or object to processing of your personal data. Where we rely on your consent to process your personal data you can withdraw that consent at any time.
However, much of the work we do is covered by client confidentiality and legal professional privilege, and this information is sometimes exempt from the data subject rights provisions, so there may be instances where we are unable to give effect to your data subject rights. However, we will always respond to your data subject rights requests, either to give effect to them (if we can) or to explain why we cannot.
You have the right to make a complaint about our processing of your personal data to the Information Commissioner’s Office whose details can be found at www.ico.org.uk
Cookies Policy
What Are Cookies?
This site, like many websites uses “cookies”, these are small pieces of textual data that are downloaded to your computer when you access this website, and are are then sent back to the website on each subsequent visit. Essentially this allows us to recognise you are as you move from page to page, and from visit to visit.
You may delete or restrict the cookies, but it may affect the functionality of this website.
The Cookies We Use
We use a service called Google Analytics to collect anonymous information about the way that visitors use our site, including which pages are visited and for how long, details of visitors’ operating system, browser and geographic location. Google Analytics does this by storing a persistent cookie on your computer, file name __utma@5rb.com. We use this information to compile reports and help us improve the website.