Terms and Conditions for Website hosting and use on BucksVoice

BucksVoice is provided for the benefit of the community of Buckinghamshire and enables community organisations, voluntary groups and parish and town councils to create and publish web content. The BucksVoice support team (henceforth referred to as “we” or “us”) on behalf of the Buckinghamshire County Council is committed to providing a high quality, accessible and responsive service.

BucksVoice enables you to:

  • register your organisation
  • create a website
  • register to post an event
  • register to take part in a discussion forum

Community groups, voluntary organisations, parish and town councils and elected Councillors may be included if they:

  • are geographically based in Bucks or close to the border of Bucks in an adjoining area: Oxfordshire, Hertfordshire, Berkshire, Milton Keynes, Northamptonshire and West London Boroughs
  • are non-commercial organisations or those providing some service benefit to the community
  • are national umbrella organisations with regional offices
  • provide accurate and full contact details as required by the service
  • Elected member of County, District, Town and Parish Council in Buckinghamshire

We reserve the right to decline any application for a website without providing any reasons and also to remove or edit any page or website that is not deemed suitable for the BucksVoice site. By using BucksVoice you ("you" as a representative of your organisation) agree to be legally bound by these terms, which shall take effect immediately on your first use of BucksVoice These terms may be revised at any time and updates posted online, so it is recommended that you review these Terms and Conditions regularly. Continued use of BucksVoice after a change has been made signifies your acceptance of the change.

1. Your Use of the BucksVoice portal

1.1 You may not copy, reproduce, republish, download, post, modify, reuse, broadcast or transmit or otherwise use, any content found on BucksVoice, including text, images or logos except for your own personal non-commercial use. This is subject to the material being reproduced accurately and not being used in a derogatory manner or in a misleading context. Where this material is being issued to others, the source (including the URL) and copyright status must be acknowledged. Permission for any other use must be obtained from the owner of the intellectual property. Please contact us to apply for written permission. Please include your contact details name, address, telephone number and email.

1.2 You agree to use BucksVoice only for lawful purposes, and in a way that does not infringe the rights of, or restrict or inhibit anyone else’s use and enjoyment of BucksVoice. Such restriction or inhibition includes conduct which is unlawful, or which may harass or cause distress or inconvenience to any person, or the transmission of obscene or offensive content. Where these restrictions are considered to have been breached, sites may be suspended for further investigation and if necessary, civil or criminal proceedings may be brought. Note – deleted pages are retained within the system for 3 months.

1.3 When invited to submit any contribution to BucksVoice, you agree by submitting your contribution to grant us a non-exclusive, royalty-free licence during the term of this agreement, to use, store and maintain the content on a server for the purposes of providing the services in accordance with this agreement.

1.4 You are responsible for obtaining Internet access to BucksVoice and that access may involve third party fees (such as Internet service provider or airtime charges). You must provide and are responsible for all hardware, software, skills and services you require to connect to the Internet, and all associated costs and charges.

You agree to:

  • provide true, accurate, current and complete information about yourself as prompted by the Service's registration form (such information being the "Registration Information")
  • maintain and promptly update the Registration Information to keep it true, accurate, current and complete

1.5 When you complete the registration process, you will receive a password and account designation. You are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of the password and account, and are fully responsible for all activities that occur under your password or account.
You agree to:

  • immediately notify the BucksVoice support team of any unauthorized use of your password or account or any other breach of security
  • ensure that you exit from your account at the end of each session

1.6 BucksVoice cannot and will not be liable for any loss or damage arising from your failure to comply with this Section.

1.7 In setting up and operating a community website using and linked to BucksVoice you must not:

  • Use the software tools or any part of the website for commercial business purposes
  • Sell, lend or otherwise allow any other person to use the software tools who is not a registered user
  • Create links with other websites, without obtaining the relevant permission or authority where required
  • Notify, sell or otherwise inform any third party of the email addresses or other personal information for any commercial purposes
  • Send unsolicited emails, sometimes referred to as 'Spam', to any persons

2. Rules for your content
2.1 In setting up and operating a community website using and linked to BucksVoice you must not distribute any material on the website that:

  • infringes any intellectual property rights or is in breach of law, statute or regulation, including the Data Protection Act 1998
  • is unlawful, defamatory, libellous, threatening, harassing, racially offensive, obscene, pornographic, indecent or otherwise objectionable
  • contains any viruses or other computer programs intended to damage, detrimentally interfere with, surreptitiously intercept or expropriate any personal information

2.2 In setting up and operating a community website using and linked to BucksVoice you must:

  • Monitor for libellous or defamatory material and must remove any such material when you become aware of its existence
  • Get a parent's or guardian's permission before taking part in any discussion forum if you are under 18 years of age
  • Take responsibility for any legal fees, damages or other expenses that may be incurred as a result of your publication
  • Maintain and promptly update the information on your site to keep it true, accurate, current and complete
  • Elected members of County, District, Town and Parish Councils in Buckinghamshire must also abide the Members' Code of Conduct for the Council(s) they are elected to.

3. Our Right and Responsibilities to You

3.1 We will host your website until such time we terminate the agreement:

  • The software tools provided by BucksVoice are intended to enable community organisations, voluntary groups and parish and town councils to establish their own websites.
  • As a Registered User, you are granted a non-exclusive limited licence to use the software tools for the purposes specified in these Terms and Conditions of Use. This software license may be terminated at any time at our absolute and sole discretion. We will not be liable for any loss or damage that you may suffer as a consequence of such termination.
  • The software tools are provided on 'as is' basis. We do not guarantee that the software tools are free of faults or viruses and we do not warrant that the software tools are adequate for any purposes.
  • We do not guarantee that the Service will be provided nor do we guarantee its quality. We do not guarantee that any notice will be given of any suspension or termination of the service. We do not undertake to provide any back-up facilities relating to the system and cannot be responsible for any loss or damage, including loss of data, whatsoever.
  • Virus protection - we make every effort to check and test material at all stages of production. It is always wise for you to run an anti-virus program on all material downloaded from the Internet. We cannot accept any responsibility for any loss, disruption or damage to your data or your computer system, which may occur whilst using material off BucksVoice.

3.2 Your authorisation to use BucksVoice automatically terminates without notice if, at our sole discretion, you fail to comply with any of the Terms and Conditions. On termination, you must cease all use of BucksVoice and destroy all and any materials copied directly or indirectly from BucksVoice. This does not limit our right to terminate at any time for Any Reason Whatsoever.

3.3 BucksVoice content is provided for the benefit of the community of Buckinghamshire. Because of the nature of community information and the necessity to rely on other contributors for information, BucksVoice cannot guarantee the accuracy or endorse any of the information provided (i.e. that it will be error free or that defects will be corrected) and will not accept liability for damages incurred as a result of use of the service.

3.4 Links provided on BucksVoice are provided to you only as a convenience and the inclusion of any link does not imply reliability and endorsement by us and we accept no liability in respect of the content.

3.5 Although the BucksVoice support team may from time to time monitor or review discussions, chat, postings, transmissions, bulletin boards and the like on BucksVoice, there is no obligation to do so and the team assume no responsibility or liability arising from the content nor for any error, omission, infringement, defamation, obscenity, or inaccuracy contained in any information within such locations on BucksVoice.

4. Supply of Information

  • Registration Data and certain other information about you is subject to the provisions of the Data Protection Act 1998.
  • Any communication or information transmitted by you as a registered user (registered means personal information entered by you for security and registrations purpose) on BucksVoice by electronic mail or otherwise shall be treated as proprietary and confidential.
  • Any communication or information transmitted by you as a user with general public access and/or anonymous access to BucksVoice by electronic mail or otherwise will be treated as non-proprietary and non-confidential.
  • Anything transmitted by you may be used by us for any purpose, including, without limitation, broadcast, transmission, publication, reproduction, disclosure, posting and any other use whatsoever.
  • Some information is collected and stored automatically when you visit the site. It is used to by BucksVoice to customise the content and/or layout, to notify users about updates, to contact users for marketing purposes and other local government purposes and is not shared with other organisations for commercial purposes.

This information includes:

a) domain name and email address of users of the websites
b) domain name and email address of visitors to the websites
c) e-mail address of those who post messages to our bulletin boards or chat areas
d) e-mail addresses of those who communicate with us via e-mail
e) information volunteered by the user
f) aggregated information on what pages users access or visit

5. General

BucksVoice grants visitors to the Site access to these pages conditional upon your agreement to accept the application of the laws of England to govern matters between us in relation to the Site and you agree to indemnify us and not hold us liable for the result of any actions you may take based on the information contained therein.

6. Our commitment to you

The BucksVoice support team is committed to providing a high quality, accessible and responsive service to the community. However, if you believe that things have gone wrong, or have any comments please contact us by email: support@bucksvoice.net