Transition to Independent Living Allowance survey – APP 5 – Privacy Collection Notice

Your personal information is protected by law, including under the Privacy Act 1988 (the Privacy Act).

The Department of Social Services (Department, we, us, our), collects personal information about individuals for a range of purposes to enable us to carry out our functions. More information about how we handle your personal information is set out in our Privacy Policy.

This privacy collection notice is designed to ensure you are aware of certain matters in relation to the Department’s collection of your personal information, as required by the Privacy Act.

What is the purpose of this Consultation?

The Department is inviting participants to provide their views on out-of-home care (OOHC) and the Transition to Independent Living Allowance (TILA) (Consultation). The Consultation will comprise of a series of questions in a survey, which participants can complete. In addition to this, you are welcome to provide your TILA Story to the Department about your experiences.

Please note that Services Australia will be assisting the Department with some of the information technology (IT) aspects of the Consultation. Information about how Services Australia handles personal information can be found in its Privacy Policy.

Your responses to the Consultation will continue to inform the delivery of the TILA payment to eligible young people aged 15 to 25 years and provide much needed information on what aspects of the payment are helpful, what aspects of the payment might be improved and how TILA contributed to eligible young people’s transition to adulthood. We are keen to understand the payment from the perspective of young people transitioning from out-of-home care, foster and kinship carers, and caseworkers (from government and non-government organisations) who have assisted a young person in OOHC apply for TILA.

As part of the Consultation, we do not ask for you to provide your name, phone number or address. However, any emails sent directly to the Department, to request either:

1. an alternate method to complete the survey, or
2. a withdrawal of your survey response, or
3. contact by the Department to follow up with you to provide Your TILA Story (also known as a TILA Story) on either the outcomes achieved by accessing the payment or supporting a young person accessing the payment, will include your name, email address and other identity details.

The Department’s intention is for participants to not be identified or be reasonably identifiable when participating in the survey. However, this may not always be possible due to various factors (e.g. if you include information in free text boxes). In addition to this, you might also provide personal information if you choose to provide your TILA Story to the Department about your experiences. If we include your TILA Story in a report or publication, we will ensure that we do not include your personal information in the report or publication.

You also have the option to withdraw your survey response and, if you chose to do so, we will need to collect limited personal information to enable the response to be removed from the survey. If we cannot identify you, we cannot withdraw your response after you submit it. We will provide each participant with a submission ID. If you later decide that you would like us to remove your response from the survey, you should quote this submission ID to us, which will enable us to identify your survey response and remove it from the process.

You can ask us to remove your survey response from the process at any time. If you do so, we will not use your personal information after that date – any information you have provided will not be included in our analysis and will not be included in any de-identified data or publications.

However, we may have already generated some data or published some information based on your personal information. In such a case, we may not be able to extract your information from the data set or the publication.

Where we are able to identify you (or reasonably identify you) from your response, we will handle your response in accordance with the Privacy Act as it will be ‘personal information’.

We will collect, or have already collected, your information (including any personal information) for one or more of the above purposes. This notice is designed to ensure you are aware of the purpose and certain matters in relation to that collection, as required by the Privacy Act.

What is ‘personal information’ and ‘sensitive information’?

‘Personal information’ is information or an opinion about an identified individual, or an individual who is reasonably identifiable. This applies whether the personal information is true or not and whether the personal information is recorded in a material form or not. For example, personal information can include an individual’s name, signature, residential address, phone number, email address, date of birth, photographs, employment information, location information from mobile devices and internet protocol addresses.

‘Sensitive information’ is a subset of personal information. It includes information or an opinion about an individual’s racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious beliefs or affiliations, philosophical beliefs, membership of associations or unions, sexual orientation or practices, criminal record, or health, genetic or biometric information. Health information includes any information regarding whether an individual has a disability and the nature of their disability.

Who is collecting your personal information?

Your personal information is being collected by the Department and by Services Australia, who will be assisting the Department with some of the IT aspects of the Consultation.

What personal information we collect

Through your participation of the Consultation, we will collect a range of information from you including:

• gender
• disability
• Indigenous status
• cultural and linguistic diverse (CALD) status
• state or territory you received the payment (if applicable) and that you are currently living in.

We may collect personal information from you as well as from other people. For example, we may collect personal information from you:

• about your personal views in relation to your experience, and others’ experience, with the TILA;
• if you include the personal information in responses to questions;
• if you want to withdraw your survey response or TILA Story (so that we can identify your response and remove it from the process: and
• if you would like to complete the survey by an alternative method.

How we collect your information

Your personal information relating to your personal views will be collected if you choose to participate in the survey. We will do this by:

• collecting information from your responses to the Engage.dss.gov.au survey; and
• collecting information from you directly through an email, particularly if you wish to provide a TILA Story or to withdraw from the survey.

We will not collect your name or contact details in the survey, but if you include personal information in your response (in responding to a question for example) we will make sure it is de-identified before it is included in data sets or published.

Why we collect your personal information

Your personal information is collected for the purposes of gaining an understanding of the TILA payment from the view of young people transitioning from out-of-home care, gather information on why people are not accessing the payment, as well as capturing the views of caseworkers and carers, which includes:

• data analysis of the responses to the questions in the survey that will not include identifiable data;
• with a person’s consent, a follow up email will be sent to obtain a TILA Story on the outcomes achieved by accessing the payment by either the young person or carer/ caseworker;
• to enable your survey response to be deleted if you chose to withdraw from the survey;
• policy development, research and evaluation connected with TILA and OOHC; and/or
• development and publishing of an insights report of survey findings that will not include identifiable data.

Some of the information collected by us from our targeted or public consultations or surveys has research value in developing policies that extend beyond the specific consultation or survey for which it was originally collected. Where this is the case, the information that we collect from this consultation may be used for our other research, evaluation or investigation purposes. In doing so, we will apply the Australian Privacy Principles to the handling of any personal information.

Where you provide contact information, we may use that information to provide you with promotional materials or activities.

Who we disclose your personal information to

Unless stated in this notice or otherwise authorised under or provided by law, no personal information will be disclosed to other organisations or third parties either in Australia or overseas.

An insight report on a summary of the findings from the survey will be published on the DSS website that will not include identifiable data.

If we receive information in response to this survey that indicates there has been any abuse or neglect towards a child or vulnerable person, including if there is an immediate threat to the safety, welfare or well-being of a child or vulnerable person, we are required to report it under Australian Law. This may include referral to the relevant state or territory authorities, in line with the relevant state, territory and commonwealth legislation.

Storage of personal information

Storage of personal information (and the disposal of information when no longer required) is managed in accordance with the Australian Government records management regime, including the Archives Act 1983, agency-specific records authorities and general records authorities. This ensures your personal information is held securely.

All personal information collected that is held by the Department is stored on Services Australia’s cloud storage, on servers located in Australia. Services Australia and the Department retains effective control over any personal information held on our cloud, and the information is handled in accordance with the Australian Privacy Principles.

Any information disclosed to external consultants will be handled in accordance with the Privacy Act and stored in accordance with agreed security protocols.

More information

Our Privacy Policy contains more information about how we handle personal information, how you can access any personal information that we hold, and how to seek correction of that personal information. It also contains information about how to make a complaint about a breach of the Australian Privacy Principles, as set out in the Privacy Act.

If you have any concerns or questions, you can contact us at privacy@dss.gov.au

TILA applications and leaving care plans

As part of this Consultation, you are not required to provide the Department with copies of your TILA application or leaving care plans. The Department does not accept or process TILA applications or leaving care plans. Any TILA applications and leaving care plans received by the Department will not be processed and will be deleted from the TILA mailbox. You need to send the TILA application form and leaving care plan to the appropriate TILA administrator.

The Department requests that no personal information is emailed to TILA@dss.gov.au. The Department can answer general enquiries about the TILA.

If personal information is received at TILA@dss.gov.au, the Department will handle it in line with its Privacy Policy.

Requests for TILA balances, including those that contain personal information of young people who are eligible for, or recipients of, the TILA will be forwarded to Services Australia at tila@servicesaustralia.gov.au and/or the relevant state or territory TILA contact for actioning. The Department may also request personal information from Services Australia, about TILA balances.

Confirmation and consent

By providing your personal information as part of your Consultation response, you consent to the Department collecting your personal information and handling your personal information in accordance with this privacy notice and the Department’s Privacy Policy.

Please note that you do not need to provide your sensitive information if you do not wish to do so.

By providing your sensitive information as part of your Consultation response, you consent to the Department collecting your sensitive information and handling your sensitive information in accordance with this privacy notice and the Department’s Privacy Policy.