Your ref:

Our ref: FOI 20094/4536

2nd November 2009

Dear Mr Walker,,

I write to clarify the situation with regards to your Freedom of Information request that you made to West Yorkshire Police on 06/10/09. You requested the following information:

This is a request under the Freedom of Information Act

In November 2008 the membership list of the British National Party (BNP) was published online. On September 1, 2009 a disgruntled former official Matt Single was convicted in relation to this for offences under the Data Protection Act.

I refer to Schedule 1 of The Data Protection Principles.

Under Schedule 1, any use of 'sensitive personal data' mus processed only when at least one of the conditions in Schedule 2 is met, and at least one of the conditions in Schedule 3 is also met.

1. Please tell me if West Yorkshire Police has processed any data relating to the leaked British National Party membership list.

2. Please tell me which of the conditions in Schedule 2 and Schedule 3 were met when processing sensitive personal data?

3. Has sensitive personal data been used for any purposes other than comparing against the West Yorkshire Police personnel database?

4. Who was responsible for the decision to compare sensitive personnel data against West Yorkshire Police's personnel data?

5. What were the grounds for such a decision?

6. I request the minutes of any meeting held to come to such a decision.

7. Please describe the process used in making such a decision and whether the consequences of this decision, if any, were assessed.

We would be grateful if you could inform us by your preferred method (contact details as above) if you still require a response to your request for information. If we do not hear from you within twenty working days from the date of this letter then we will assume that you no longer require the information that you have requested.

Please be assured that if you do still wish for us to proceed then we will be happy to do so.

Thank you for your cooperation in this matter.

Yours sincerely

Superintendent Tyron Joyce

Information Management