Privacy Policy

The Provincial Grand Lodge of Cheshire respects the privacy of our Members, Staff, Contractors/Suppliers and Visitors/Subscribers to our website and social-media channels.

This policy explains how we collect information, what we do with it and what controls you have.

1. Your Privacy

The Provincial Grand Lodge of Cheshire covers the original boundaries of the County of Cheshire. We are the administrative ‘headquarters’ for Freemasons who are members of Lodges and Chapters meeting in this Province. We meet under the auspices of the United Grand Lodge of England (UGLE), which is itself based in Great Queen Street, London.

We take our duty to keep your data secure and private and to process your personal data in a way that you would approve of and in keeping with the General Data Protection Regulation very seriously. This policy explains how we collect, manage, use and protect your personal data.

We may change this document from time to time to reflect the latest view of what we do with your information. Please check back frequently; you will be able to see if changes have been made by virtue of the date it was last amended.

2. Who are we?

In this policy references to ‘The Provincial Grand Lodge of Cheshire’ or the ‘Province’, or to ‘we’ or ‘us’ mean The Provincial Grand Lodge of Cheshire.

3. What personal data do we collect and how do we use it?

3.1 What we need

The Provincial Grand Lodge of Cheshire is what is known as the ‘controller’ of the personal data provided to us. We will usually only collect personal data about our Members, i.e.

• name
• date of birth
• home address
• occupation
• telephone numbers
• email address and
• Masonic CV (i.e., offices and ranks held).

Members bank details will be kept if they are supporting Masonic Charities through regular giving.

No other information is collected or stored and the system does not have the facility to store any other information or personal comments about any member other than those relating to their membership.

For security and safety purposes we may also keep a record of visitors to the Provincial Office (and their car registration number).

3.2 Why we need it

We only keep the data necessary to administer the membership rights and expectations of the Freemasons of Cheshire. We don’t collect any other personal data in connection with our routine activities. Specifically the data we need is used for:

1. Assessing any Masonic applications you make;
2. Registering you as a member of Freemasonry;
3. Sending communications to which you are entitled as a Mason;
4. Recording the progress of your career in Freemasonry;
5. Masonic disciplinary processes;
6. If you resign or are expelled from membership, maintaining records to prevent you from improperly re-applying for membership; and
7. Maintaining records of your career in Freemasonry for archive and historical purposes

3.3 Criminal convictions

Criminal conviction data will only be used by the Provincial Grand Lodge (and the United Grand Lodge of England) to:

1. Determine your suitability to become a Freemason;
2. Determine your suitability to remain a Freemason; or to
3. Maintain records to prevent you from improperly re-applying for membership if you have ceased to be a Freemason by resignation or expulsion.

Freemasons are expected to conform to high standards. As a candidate you must disclose any criminal convictions, unless it is spent under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974.

Prior to joining, the legal basis on which this data is processed is your consent. You can withdraw your consent and request erasure of your criminal conviction data at anytime by notifying your Proposer and Seconder that you wish to cancel your application.

If convicted of an offence when a Freemason, you must report certain criminal convictions to your Lodge Master or the Grand Secretary in accordance with Rule 179A of the Book of Constitutions. The Master of your Lodge may also report such convictions to other Masonic entities in accordance with the Book of Constitutions and the disciplinary processes of Freemasonry.

These reports are made for purpose 2. above, and data in them can be retained for purpose 3. above. The legal basis on which this data is processed is the legitimate interests of the Masonic entities as membership organisations in upholding their values. The processing falls within the “processing by not-for-profit bodies” exemption to permit processing of criminal convictions data.

3.4 Archiving and historical research

Many Masonic records, which may contain your data are archived for the public interest and kept for historical research. When they are no longer needed by your Lodge or the Province of Cheshire, they are loaned or given to the Library and Museum of Freemasonry, a charity registered in England with charity registration number 1058497. The records that are loaned are transferred permanently to the charity when the Masonic Entity considers appropriate.

The charity currently restricts access to the records for 70 years except where they might contain sensitive personal information in which case access is restricted for 100 years. These periods are subject to change to reflect best practice. During this time only you or your legal representative will be able to view your personal data. After this time the records are made available to academic researchers and others in accordance with the charity’s work. More information about the charity’s work can be found at www.freemasonry.london.museum

3.5 Our suppliers

On occasions, we may process personal data when we need to do so to fulfil a contract, (for example, if you are paying an invoice from, or are supplying a service to the Provincial Office) or where we are required to do this by law or other regulations.

The Provincial Grand Lodge of Cheshire also processes Members data when it is in our ‘legitimate interests’ to do so and when these interests do not override your rights. Those legitimate interests include providing you with information on our appeals, Masonic matters, membership, fundraising, newsletter requests, feedback and other activities including those of connected Masonic Charities.

We will also keep information with your details so that we can respect your preferences for being contacted by us.

3.6 How we obtain your details

The Province is given access to member’s personal details that they provide when they apply to join. Their details are subsequently recorded and updated from time-to-time by the completion of a further ‘Form P’ when joining or re-joining another Lodge or Chapter. Another way member information is updated is from the Annual Installation Returns completed by the Secretary/Scribe E or the submission of a form as part of the Honours system. All of these are used to ensure that member’s details are kept as accurate as possible

3.7 How else can my information be updated?

When a Member receives a letter offering a Provincial appointment/honour, they are asked to alter/correct their information and return it; any updates/corrections are then applied. A Member or their Secretary/Scribe E may also update personal information or membership status at any time by contacting the Provincial Office.

3.8 Children

Membership of Freemasonry does not extend to young people under the age of 18.

Please note that we will not knowingly accept donations or goods or services from persons under 18 years.

3.9 Where is my data processed and held?

It is stored securely (using password protected user accounts) on a national membership system called Adelphi2 managed and maintained by UGLE and which also downloads into a mirror system used by the Province called Keystone; at some point in the future however, this will become obsolete and the only system used will be Adelphi2.

Our staff process all the personal data held by us, here in the UK however, for the purposes of IT hosting and maintenance, your information may be situated outside of the European Economic Area (EEA). This will be done in accordance with guidance issued by the Information Commissioner’s Office.

3.9.1 Who can see my information

In respect of Keystone, this information can only be accessed by members of staff or holders of certain Provincial or District Offices for the sole purpose of the administration of the business of the Province and/or their duties. It must not be accessed or used for any other purpose. All users are authorised by the Provincial Secretary (The Data Controller). For Adelphi2, access is granted by UGLE.

Remember, as a Member you may at any time see and request a copy of your data by simply contacting the Provincial Office.

3.9.2 Sharing your information

We only disclose information to third parties or individuals when obliged to by law, for purposes of national security, taxation (Gift Aid), criminal investigations and the following:

• If you have agreed that we may do so.
• When we use other companies to provide services on our behalf, e.g. processing bank, credit/debit card payments.
• To Masonic bodies under the UGLE and its ‘subsidiaries’ (i.e. the Masonic companies and charities).
• If we receive a complaint about any content you have posted or transmitted to or from one of our sites or if we believe that we need to do so to protect and defend the rights, property or personal safety of The Provincial Grand Lodge of Cheshire, our premises, websites, members or visitors and for other lawful purposes.
• We may disclose aggregate statistics about our site visitors to other (Masonic) third parties for other lawful purposes, but these statistics won’t include any personally identifying information.
• If we run an event in partnership with other named organisations your details may need to be shared. If that is the case, we will be very clear what will happen to your data when you register to take part and you will have the option to opt out without detriment to your participation.

3.9.3 Masonic charities

Masonic charities need to keep their donor databases accurate and up to date for the purpose of claiming Gift Aid on donations. Masonic entities may permit those charities to verify their donor databases against your name and address data that they hold.  The legal basis for this processing is the ‘legitimate interests’ of that charity.

Masonic charities provide, among other work, support to Masons, former Masons and their relatives. Masonic entities would like to be able to share your personal data with recognised Masonic charities so that the charities can process it:

1. On receipt of an application for relief, to determine whether you or your relatives are eligible beneficiaries; and
2. Where you have separately consented to a Masonic charity contacting you with fundraising materials and to allow that charity to update your contact details in their fundraising database by viewing your contact details held by Masonic entities.

Your data will not be processed by Masonic entities unless you have provided your consent to the processing. You may change these two optional consents at any time by emailing dataprotection@ugle.org.uk.

We will never sell or rent your personal information to other organisations.

4. Legitimate interests

There are a number of lawful reasons that allow us to use (or ‘process’) your personal information. One lawful reason is something called ‘legitimate interests’. Broadly speaking Legitimate Interests means we can process your personal information if:

• We have a genuine and legitimate reason.
and
• We are not harming any of your rights and interests.

The legal bases on which your personal data will be used are:

1. the legitimate interests of Masonic entities as not for profit membership organisations; and
2. the fulfilment of contractual obligations owed to you by your Lodge or Chapter supported by its affiliated Masonic entities.

5. Retaining your information

We hold your information only as long as necessary for each purpose we use it, we will provide examples of some of our retentions in this paragraph soon to give you an idea of how long we hold your information for.

If you decide to resign from Freemasonry or request that we have no further contact with you, we will keep some basic information in order to avoid sending you unwanted materials in the future; we will also keep a record of your membership should you decide to rejoin at a future date and to ensure that we don’t accidentally duplicate information.

6. Your details on the web: Our Cookie Policy

Our website as do almost all websites, uses cookies.
The purpose of a cookie is to tell the Web server that you have returned to a specific Web page. When you visit the same Web site, any information you previously provided can be retrieved, so you can easily use the Web site features that you previously chose.

Cookies cannot be used to run code (run programs) or to deliver viruses to your computer.

6.1 We use cookies to:

• Make our website work as expected
• Improve the speed/security of the site
• Allow you to share pages with social networks like Facebook
• Continuously improve our website for you; and to,
• Track visits to the sites articles so we know what kind of information is popular with our visitors

6.1.1 Website Function Cookies

We use cookies to make certain functions on our website work including:

• Allowing you to vote in polls
• Blocking the IP addresses of known or potential hackers
• There is no way to prevent these cookies being set other than to not use our site or disabling them in your browser settings.

6.1.2 Third party functions

Like most websites we include functionality provided by third parties. Our site includes the following that may use cookies

• Videos (powered by YouTube and Vimeo)
• Google Maps
• Other embedded content

6.1.3 Social Website Cookies

So that you can share our content on the likes of Facebook and X we have included sharing buttons on our site.

6.1.4 Cookies are set by:

• Facebook
• X

The privacy implications on this will vary from social network to social network and will depend on your settings with them.

6.1.5 Visitor Statistics Cookies

We use cookies to compile visitor statistics such as how many people have visited our website, what type of technology they are using (e.g. Mac OS X or Windows PC) which helps to identify how our site works on particular platforms. This helps us to continuously improve our website. These so called “analytics” programs also tell us, on an anonymous basis, how people reached this site (e.g. from Google) and whether they have been here before helping us develop our services.

6.1.6 Google Analytics

You can opt-out of being tracked by Google Analytics (we’d prefer you did not though, as this data is seriously helpful to us in improving our website and therefore your experience on it https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout)

6.1.7 Turning Cookies Off

You can usually switch cookies off by adjusting your browser settings to stop it from accepting cookies. Doing so however will likely limit the functionality of our, and a large proportion of the world’s, websites as cookies are a standard part of most modern websites.

6.2 We do not use cookies to

Collect any personally identifiable information, collect any sensitive information, or pass personally identifiable data to third parties.

7. Data Security

We take all practical measures to maintain your data in a secure environment. We use industry approved and tested virus protection, install patches and updates automatically to ensure our ICT is protected and data isn’t lost through breakdown or hacking. Premises and filing cabinets are kept locked (when the Provincial Office is unattended) and a clear desk policy maintained.

7.1 What are your rights?

From May 2018, the General Data Protection Regulation gave everyone a number of very important rights. These are:

• Transparency over how we use your personal information (right to be informed).
• The right to request a copy of the information we hold about you, which will be provided to you within one month (right of access).
• The right to update or amend the information we hold about you if it is wrong (right of rectification).
• The right to ask us to stop using your information (right to restrict processing).
• The right to ask us to remove your personal information from our records (right to be ‘forgotten’).
• The right to object to the processing of your information for marketing purposes (right to object).
• The right to obtain and reuse your personal data for your own purposes (right to data portability).
• And, the right not be subject to a decision when it is based on automated processing (automated decision making and profiling).

If you would like to know more about your rights under the data protection regulation see the Information Commissioners Office website

8. How to contact us

If you wish to talk through anything in our privacy policy, find out more about your rights or obtain a copy of the information we hold about you, please contact our Provincial team (details at the bottom of this page) who will be happy to help. If you wish to raise a complaint on how we have handled your personal data, you can contact our data protection officer at dataprotection@cheshiremasons.co.uk who will investigate the matter. If you are not satisfied with our response or believe we are not processing your personal data in accordance with the law, you can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO).

If you would like to change the way you hear from us, or no longer wish to receive communications from us, then please use the form on our ‘Join Us’ page to inform us.

Our data protection officer can also be contacted by writing to the address below. If you wish to talk to us about anything in this policy or about the information we hold about you, please contact our Provincial team:

• By telephone: 0161 980 6090
• By email: dataprotection@cheshiremasons.co.uk
• By post:

Provincial Grand Lodge of Cheshire
Ashcroft House,
36 Clay Lane,
Timperley,
Altrincham,
Cheshire WA15 7AB