The Scottish Parliament processes your personal data when you sign up to receive Parliamentary newsletters and email bulletins covering different topics that relate to the work carried out by the Scottish Parliament.
We use a UK based third-party provider (Email Blaster UK) to deliver our Parliamentary newsletters. This allows us to gather statistics on email opens and clicks on links to help us monitor and improve our products.
The data captured by our third-party provider for tracking and reporting includes your IP address and IP based location.
In order to send Parliamentary newsletters the Scottish Parliament processes normal category data, consisting of your name and email address.
The personal information is provided to us directly when you (referred to as ‘the data subject’) complete a subscription form to receive Parliamentary newsletters on the Scottish Parliament website or the Festival of Politics website.
You may also provide details by completing a hard-copy subscription form or a subscription section on a feedback form, for example, for the Festival of Politics. This information will then be added manually to the subscription database by Scottish Parliament staff for the specific newsletter requested.
The Education News newsletter also use school email addresses taken from the school contact details taken from the Scottish Government website: https://www.gov.scot/publications/school-contact-details
Newsletters issued by Participation and Communities Team will also use information of individuals who signed up to the newsletter via the PACT Contact List
Data protection law states that we must have a legal basis for handling your personal data.
The legal basis for processing personal data for the purposes of subscribing to receive Parliamentary newsletters is that it is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest (Article 6(1)(e) of the UK GDPR and section 8(d) of the Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA)).
The task is to facilitate continued engagement of stakeholders with the work of the Scottish Parliament which is part of the core function of the SPCB as an activity that supports or promotes democratic engagement in terms of section 8(e) of the DPA.
We use a UK-based third-party provider (Email Blaster UK) as a data processor to manage subscriptions and issue email bulletins.
Further information on the Email Blaster UK privacy policy
All data collected, stored and used by Email Blaster UK is held in the UK. Information held on secure servers in their data centre are accessed only by nominated Email Blaster UK personnel.
Information about subscribers can be accessed only by a limited number of Parliament staff.
Subscribers to Parliamentary newsletters can update their details at any time by contacting [email protected].
Your name and contact details information will remain on the Email Blaster UK system and will be used to send email bulletins until you choose to unsubscribe.
An ‘Unsubscribe’ link is included on all email bulletins and subscribers can unsubscribe at any time. If you unsubscribe, you will immediately be taken off the distribution list for the relevant bulletin. Your personal information will then be held on a suppression list. It will be removed from its system entirely after the end of the contract with Email Blaster UK.
Hard copies of subscription forms will be stored securely, reviewed regularly and destroyed no more than three months after the individual has unsubscribed.
When the contract with Email Blaster UK ends, should the Parliament procure a new contract for the provision of this service, the subscriber lists at the end of the contract will be transferred to the provider of the new contract and this information will be securely deleted from the secure system held by Email Blaster UK.
As part of this process:
Data protection legislation sets out the rights which individuals have in relation to personal data held about them by data controllers. Applicable rights are listed below. You can exercise your data subject rights in particular circumstances depending on the purpose for which the data controller is processing the data and the legal basis upon which the processing takes place.
The following rights may apply:
You have the right to request a copy of the personal information about you that we hold. For further information, have a look at our page on Making a Subject Access Request.
You have the right to ask us to correct the personal data we hold about you. We want to make sure that your personal information is accurate, complete and up to date and you may ask us to correct any personal information about you that you believe does not meet these standards.
Where we use your personal information to perform tasks carried out in the public interest then, if you ask us to, we will stop using that personal information unless there are overriding legitimate grounds to continue.
You have the right to ask us to delete personal information about you where:
In some cases, you may ask us to restrict how we use your personal information. This right might apply, for example, where we are checking the accuracy of personal information about you that we hold or assessing the validity of any objection you have made to our use of your information. The right might also apply where this is no longer a basis for using your personal information, but you don't want us to delete the data. Where this right is validly exercised, we may only use the relevant personal information with your consent, for legal claims or where there are other public interest grounds to do so.
We keep this privacy statement under regular review and will place any updates on this website. Paper copies of the privacy statement may also be obtained using the contact information below.
This privacy statement was last updated on 24 March 2026.
If you have any further questions about the way in which we process personal data, or about how to exercise your rights, please contact the Head of Information Governance and Data Protection Officer at:
The Scottish Parliament
Edinburgh
EH99 1SP
Email: [email protected]
If you are concerned that we have not handled your personal information properly you can make a complaint to the Information Governance Team of the Scottish Parliament at the following address: [email protected]. We will respond to your complaint without undue delay and within one month. If, having made a complaint, you are still concerned that your personal information has not been handled properly, you can make a complaint to the Information Commissioner's Office.