What do we mean by profiling? 

Profiling is where personal data is used to evaluate certain things about an individual. This can be done by a human or a computer which can also be automatic based on parameters we set for the computer.  

Where it is automatic, this is known as automated decision-making. Automated decision-making is where a decision is made using your personal data which is done solely by automated means. 

Why does Labour profile people’s personal data? 

Profiling of personal data is used by the Labour Party to make predictions about individual electors, wide demographic groups or areas of the country. This is not always done with personal data and other ways of anonymous profiling are also used by us. 

The activity of profiling may constitute automated decision-making in some cases – for example, whether or not you receive a particular piece of direct mail – but this does not produce any legal effects or similarly significant effects on the people whose personal data we have used for this. 

The Labour Party carries out profiling for a variety of reasons, including: 

• To contact you to canvass your political support and ascertain your voting intention, encourage you to vote, or register for a postal vote; 
• To manage the internal governance of the Labour Party and our membership database; 
• To communicate with you about our policies, campaigns, events and opportunities to get involved with the party;  

• To understand what issues are most likely to be relevant to you and your area; 
• To decide to whom we should send our campaign materials and messages; 
• To choose which messages and content we put on the materials we send to you, or show you on social media; 
• To advertise to you on social media; 
• To allow us to estimate which way you might vote in elections and referendums, and how likely you are to vote at all; 
• To estimate your political attitudes; 
• To help us understand in which areas, at which times of day, and with which people we should focus our campaigning efforts; 
• To inform the development of our policy position for future elections and referendums at every level. 

What personal data do we use in our profiling? 

We shall be mainly profiling the personal data of the general electorate and our membership database although other types of personal data may be meaningful within our profiling activities. 

You can find the General Electorate and Labour Members Privacy Notices as well as all our other privacy notices by clicking here and can see what personal data we may use for profiling within them.  

Where do we get your personal data? 

For our profiling activities we collect personal data from a range of sources and in a variety of ways. We refer to “direct data collection” when data is collected directly from you, and we refer to “indirect data collection” when the data is not collected directly from you. Here is a list of where we get your data from: 

• The full electoral register (indirect data collection); 
• Demographic data about you from our commercial supplier (indirect data collection); 
• Data on political opinions we have collected from you on the doorstep, phone or via other methods of capturing data directly from you (direct data collection); 
• The ‘Marked Register’ data (the record of whether or not people on the electoral register voted at a given election, which is available for political parties to purchase) (indirect data collection);  
• Online or physical surveys, questionnaires or polls you have answered or completed for us where you may or may not have had the option to tell us who you are, or you may have chosen to remain anonymous (direct data collection); and 

• Publicly available data from areas such as census data (indirect data collection). 

We will only ever use the minimum amount of data needed to create these profiles and we delete this data after a maximum of seven years. 

What are the kinds of profiling you do?  

The profiling the Labour Party does, which helps us to fulfil the purposes described above, includes: 

• Predicting how likely you are to support the Labour Party or other political parties; 
• Predicting how likely you are to vote for a particular side in different hypothetical referenda; 
• Predicting how likely you are to vote in different types of elections; 
• Predicting how likely you are to be interested in a range of different issues; 
• predicting how likely you are to answer the door or pick up the phone at particular times of day; 
• Predicting how likely you are to switch your support between a variety of political parties; and 
• Predicting where you are likely to be positioned on a scale of political attitudes. 

This profiling typically includes the assignment of a ‘score’ to each elector, but sometimes we may also produce a ‘rank’ and/or ‘decile’ for each elector indicating how they compare to other electors in their constituency, ward or other geography. 

Is the profiling you do legal? 

Yes, it is. Our legal basis for profiling is a mixture of both Legitimate Interests (GDPR Article 6 (f)) and Public Task (GDPR Article 6(1)(e)) in order to engage with voters and send them messages which they are likely to be interested in.  

This forms a part of the democratic process, of which political party campaigning plays an important role. It may seem strange but we do not need to gather your consent for this use of your data as it aligns with the definition of ‘democratic engagement’ activities we conduct which is allowed for registered political parties  as written in section 8 of the Data Protection Act 2018.  

Further information on the meaning of ‘democratic engagement’ activities can be accessed by clicking here. 

Further Purposes and Lawful Bases for using personal data 

Purpose for using personal data	Lawful basis for using
To identify personal data and take relevant action upon submission of a data subject rights request.	Compliance with a legal obligation under UK GDPR Article 6.1(c). The legal obligation is the UK General Data Protection Regulation to uphold your data protection rights. Special categories of personal data used for the purpose of Substantial Public Interest (Preventing or detecting unlawful acts; Protecting the public; Regulatory requirements) under UK GDPR Article 9.2(g).
To be able to assess any impact on individuals of a data breach involving personal data held on Labour Party systems or on third party systems.
To help protect an individual from neglect or physical, mental or emotional harm, or protect the physical, mental or emotional well-being of an individual.	Use of the personal data is necessary to protect the vital interests of an individual or individuals in accordance with UK GDPR Article 6.1(d). Special categories of personal data used for the purpose of Substantial Public Interest (Preventing or detecting unlawful acts; Protecting the public; Regulatory requirements) under UK GDPR Article 9.2(g).
To deal with legal claims and ongoing litigation cases.	Compliance with a legal obligation under UK GDPR Article 6.1(c). The legal obligation is the UK General Data Protection Regulation to uphold your data protection rights. Special categories of personal data used for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims or whenever courts are acting in their judicial capacity under UK GDPR Article 9.2(f).

Who do we share your personal data with? 

Any data shared with the below categories of recipients is the minimum necessary for the task they have been instructed to carry out on our behalf or in conjunction with us. Each category of recipient is subject to review by the Data Protection Team to make sure they have the right methods in place for keeping your personal data secure. 

Where the sharing of personal data is within the context of a product or service being supplied under contract to Labour, a Data Processing Agreement, in accordance with GDPR Article 28 is put in place. This makes sure the supplier cannot use your personal data outside of the list of uses above. 

Within the purposes of using your personal data, as listed above, we will share your personal data with the following: 

1. Pre-approved digital profiling system providers; 

2. Pre-approved online survey or questionnaire platform providers; 

3. Pre-approved digital communications and storage providers; and 

4. Pre-approved expert social media platform analysis and maintenance providers. 

There may be scenarios where we are subject to a legal obligation to disclose or share your personal data, such as with law enforcement agencies, regulatory bodies or public authorities in order to prevent or detect crime, or prove we have adhered to their request. We will only ever disclose your personal data to these third parties to the extent we are required to do so by law. 

Data sharing with a third-party organisation that is not a supplier of a product or service to Labour does not occur unless there is a legal obligation or sound lawful purpose for such sharing.  For any such sharing we put a Data Sharing Agreement in place between Labour and the third-party containing specific information in accordance with the Information Commissioner’s Office ‘Data sharing code of practice’.  

This will include giving only relevant and often only geographically restricted access to your personal data to our local Labour Party organisations, Labour Candidates hoping to be elected, Labour Councillors, Labour Mayors and Labour Members of Parliament (MPs) so they can all conduct their democratic engagement activities. 

You can find further information on how local Labour Party organisations, Labour Candidates hoping to be elected, Labour Councillors, Labour Mayors and Labour Members of Parliament (MPs) use your personal data on their respective websites and more generally within our list of privacy notices which can be accessed by clicking here. 

Information on the meaning of ‘democratic engagement’ for national and local political parties, and their candidates and elected representatives can be found by clicking here. 

In all circumstances, the unlawful and unauthorised sharing of copies of personal data in which the Labour Party is the data controller is expressly prohibited. Any unauthorised sharing of Labour Party data is classified as a data breach which we will record and report to the ICO as required. 

What are your rights and how can you express them? 

To understand your data privacy rights and to submit a rights request, the best way to do so is by visiting the ‘YOUR RIGHTS’ page on our website which you can get to by clicking here. 

How can you complain about our use your personal data? 

The best way to make a complaint is by visiting our page on ‘HOW TO MAKE A DATA PROTECTION COMPLAINT’ which you can access by clicking here.  

How can you contact us about this privacy notice? 

If you have any questions about the information in this privacy notice, then you can contact the Data Protection Team via email using [email protected] or by post within a letter to: 

Labour Statutory Data Protection Officer 

The Labour Party, Southworks, 20 Rushworth Street, United Kingdom, SE1 0SS 

When was this privacy notice last updated? 

We may update this notice (and any supplemental privacy notice), from time to time as shown below. We will notify you of the changes where required by applicable law to do so.