Privacy Policy

Last Updated: August 2026

Welcome to Positive Plymouth (accessible via our custom web domain). This website is operated by John Govier ("we", "our", "us") as an independent, non-commercial community magazine project. We are committed to protecting and respecting your privacy in strict accordance with the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018.

This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, process, and protect any personal data you provide to us when using this website, specifically regarding our community contact form, and how we handle your digital privacy.

1. The Data Controller

For the purposes of the UK GDPR, the Data Controller for this website is:

• Name: John Govier

• Contact Method: You can contact the Data Controller directly by filling out the secure contact form on our Contact page.

2. Personal Data We Collect

We only collect personal information that you voluntarily choose to submit to us. We do not gather any sensitive personal data. We collect data through the following mechanism:

The "Submit a Feature Idea" Contact Form

When you submit a local news tip, story lead, event detail, or photograph, we collect:

• Your Name

• Your Email Address

• The Content / Story Text of your message

• Any Image Files / Photographs you choose to upload and submit to us.

3. How and Why We Use Your Data (Lawful Basis)

Under the UK GDPR, we must establish a clear legal basis to process your personal data. We rely on the following bases:

• Consent: By filling out our form, checking our contribution disclaimers, and clicking "Submit", you grant us explicit consent to process your text and images to evaluate them for publication.

• Legitimate Interests: We process your contact data under the legitimate interest of operating a public community magazine, communicating with contributors, and verifying the accuracy of local story submissions.

We use your data strictly to:

• Review and evaluate your editorial tips, event details, or local history leads.

• Publish submitted photographs in our In Pictures gallery or articles (subject to your consent and ownership declaration).

• Contact you directly to follow up on your submission or verify story facts.

4. Data Storage, Retention, and Security

We treat your personal data with the highest standards of security and confidentiality:

• Sole Access: John Govier has sole, exclusive password-protected access to the email inbox and web dashboard where your form submissions are processed. No third parties have access to this inbox.

• No Third-Party Routing: Your uploaded files and text data stay strictly within our secure Squarespace platform asset library and our direct email inbox. Your data is never routed to external cloud drives (such as Google Drive or Dropbox) or third-party databases.

• Retention Period: We retain your form submissions, email exchanges, and uploaded media assets indefinitely. This permanent retention is held strictly to provide a necessary evidentiary backup in the event of any future legal disputes, factual discrepancy challenges, or copyright ownership queries regarding published content.

• No Data Selling: We do not, and will never, sell, rent, lease, share, or distribute your personal data or email addresses to any corporate third parties, marketing agencies, or commercial businesses.

5. Website Analytics and Cookies

Our website is hosted on the Squarespace platform. Squarespace utilizes cookies and similar technologies to ensure our website functions securely and to provide basic website traffic tracking (such as counting visitor numbers and monitoring which local features are most popular).

• GDPR Cookie Banner: In compliance with UK law, all non-essential analytics tracking cookies are completely frozen when you arrive at our site. Tracking will only execute if you consciously choose to click "Accept All" on our cookie notice bar.

• External Tracking: We do not use any external commercial tracking networks, such as Google Analytics or a Facebook Pixel. We rely strictly on Squarespace's internal, protected platform metrics.

6. Your Legal Rights Under UK GDPR

As a UK resident, you hold strong statutory rights regarding your personal data. You have the right to request:

• Access: A copy of the personal data we hold about you (your past form submissions).

• Correction: The right to amend or rectify any incorrect information we display about you.

• Erasure: The right to request that we permanently delete your contact data or remove your submitted photographs from our archives.

• Withdrawal of Consent: The right to withdraw your consent to our data processing at any time.

To exercise any of these rights, please message the Data Controller directly via our website Contact form. We will respond to and process your request within the statutory 30-day limit free of charge.

If you are unsatisfied with how we handle your data privacy, you have the right to lodge a formal complaint with the UK supervisory authority: The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) at www.ico.org.uk.