New Disability Employment Support Model – Privacy notice
DSS Engage Consultation – APP 5 Privacy Collection Notice
Your personal information is protected by law, including under the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) (the Privacy Act).
The Department of Social Services (department, we, us), collects personal information about individuals for a range of purposes to enable it to carry out its 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 currently inviting stakeholders to provide their views on the New Disability Employment Support Model Consultation (Consultation).
The Australian Government is committed to improving the social and economic participation of people with disability. The Government’s Disability Employment Services (DES) program plays an important role in helping people with disability find and keep employment in the open labour market.
The current DES program concludes on 30 June 2023, and the department is considering options for a new disability employment support model that will improve employment outcomes for people with disability and better meet the needs of participants and employers.
The Consultation will form part of a broader consultation process to review the current DES program and inform options for reform. Feedback provided in the Consultation will form the basis of a report summarising stakeholder concerns and issues for consideration in the reforms process.
As part of this Consultation you will be asked to provide information, including personal information. Other than your email address, it is your choice what other personal information you provide us.
As part of this Consultation, your information may be disclosed to external consultants who are assisting the department’s broader consultation work on reforming the DES program and delivery of a final report. At this stage, the department may disclose information to PricewaterhouseCoopers ABN 52 780 433 757 (PwC) and Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu ABN 74 490 121 060 (Deloitte), but may disclose information to other contractors or consultants where required.
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 information technology (IT) aspects of the Consultation.
What personal information we collect
As part of this Consultation, we will be collecting commentary from the public and organisations who wish to provide their opinions or insights into the issues raised in the New Disability Employment Support Model Consultation Paper.
Through your participation in the Consultation, we may collect some personal information (some of which could be sensitive information) if you choose to provide that information to us.
The personal information we will require includes your:
- name or other identifying information (you can choose to remain anonymous); and
- email address.
The personal information we will ask for, but is optional to provide, includes:
- your age, sexual orientation, CALD status, disability status and if you identify as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander;
- location information, such as your state or territory and if that is remote/regional/metro;
- employment information;
- the name of the organisation that you represent;
- information about whether you are a carer, parent or family member of a person with a disability;
- information about your participation in the DES program; and
- any feedback and comments you wish to share, such as the nature of any disability or employment information or anything else you wish to contribute.
We may collect personal information from you directly, 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 the experience of others, with the DES program;
- your personal views about proposed options for reforming the DES program; and
- whether you think those options improve outcomes for DES program participants.
As part of the Consultation, we will not ask for you to provide your phone number or home address.
You can also choose to provide your own contact details or details of your personal circumstances. 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 your information (including any personal information) for one or more of the purposes specified in this Privacy Notice.
The personal information that Services Australia will collect is your IP address and information about your device’s operating system.
How we collect your personal information
Your personal information relating to your personal views and lived experience may be collected if you choose to make a submission as part of this Consultation. We will do this by:
- collecting information provided by you in your submission lodged through Engage.dss.gov.au; and
- collecting information provided by you in an email or postal submission received from you.
Why we collect your personal information and how it will be used
Your personal information is collected for the purposes of informing options for reforming the DES program, and ensuring that the views of relevant stakeholders (including people with a disability) are incorporated into the design of a resulting future disability employment support program.
The information collected through this Consultation will be used to create a report that summarises stakeholder feedback and issues for consideration in the DES program reforms process. The report will be published on the DSS Engage website.
If you do not provide your personal identifying information (including sensitive information), we will still be able to consider your views as part of this process and your identity will remain anonymous.
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 related research purposes. In doing so, we will handle your personal information in accordance with the Privacy Act.
Who we disclose your personal information to
The information you provide in your submission, including personal information, will be published and be made publicly available on the DSS Engage website. Public submissions and their author may be referenced by the department in relation to the employment of people with a disability.
We will be developing a report of the key issues raised during the consultation process. The report will be published on the DSS Engage website. This report will make reference to individual submissions and their author, and organisation if applicable.
We will ask you if you consent to your name being included in the publication of your feedback on either the DSS Engage website or in the report. However, you cannot opt-out of having your submission published. If you make a submission, you consent to having your submission published on the DSS Engage website and/or the report, either with your personal information or anonymously.
We will not publish your submission if we consider (for any reason) that it should not be made public. We may redact parts of your feedback before publication, as appropriate. This may occur in circumstances where the submission contains information that is not relevant to this Consultation, contains personal or sensitive information, could potentially defame others, is offensive in nature, or contains operationally sensitive information.
Your information may be disclosed to PwC and Deloitte who are assisting the department’s broader consultation work on reforming the DES program and delivery of a final report. Your information may also be disclosed to other contractors and consultants engaged by the department where required. Your information will only be disclosed to these parties where it is necessary to inform their work for the department.
Your information may be disclosed to individuals within agencies, organisations and bodies that will be working with the department on the review and reform of the DES program, including Ministers and their staff, state and territory governments, advisory groups to the Australian Government, and the Australian National Audit Office.
No information about you will be disclosed overseas unless your submission is published or made publicly available, or your information is disclosed to an external consultant or contractor.
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 the department handles 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.
In the event that your personal information is disclosed to PwC, information about how it may handle your personal information is set out in its Privacy Policy.
In the event that your personal information is disclosed to Deloitte, information about how it may handle your personal information is set out in its Privacy Policy.
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.