14 April 2023
Your request
1) In respect of your children's social services department, please provide your policy on the retention of WhatsApp/text messages between allocated social worker and child.
2) Please provide your policy on how long you retain emails received and policy issued to employees around not deleting emails.
Our response
Under FOI Section 1(1) any person making a request for information to a public authority is entitled (a) to be informed in writing by the public authority whether it holds information of the description specified in the request (b) if that is the case, to have that information communicated to them.
I am advised by my colleagues that Lambeth Council does not hold any such information. This is because we do not have specific policies on the retention of emails or WhatsApp/Text messages, rather the polices are regarding retention of the data within.
Consequently, the answer to Section 1(1)(a) is no and thus our further duty under 1(1)(b) does not arise on this occasion.
However, as per s16 of the Freedom of Information Act (duty to provide advice and assistance), we can provide the Records management and Retention Policy and the Retention Schedule.
Please also note that personal data has been redacted from these documents, as we consider disclosure would breach the Data Protection Act 2018 and therefore engage Section 40(2): Personal Data to this request.
The definition of personal data is set out in provision 3 of the Data Protection Act 2018 as follows:-
(2)“Personal data” means any information relating to an identified or identifiable living individual.
(3)“Identifiable living individual” means a living individual who can be identified, directly or indirectly, in particular by reference to—
(a)an identifier such as a name, an identification number, location data or an online identifier, or
(b)one or more factors specific to the physical, physiological, genetic, mental, economic, cultural or social identity of the individual.