Protect Interim Chief Executive, Jon Cunningham appears in the latest issue of Public Sector Focus discussing why it is vital local authorities have in place strong whistleblowing arrangements. “Overburdened, under-funded and under-pressure they maybe but now more than ever local authorities need robust whistleblowing procedures as standard good governance – it could help prevent or … Read more
The Government has brought forward proposals to tackle NDA (non-disclosure agreements) in harassment and discrimination cases following the #MeToo movement. Our view is these proposals will make just a small dent in improving common practices in concluding settlement agreements. The proposals address only a small part of the wider problem of sexual harassment in the … Read more
Protect is calling on the government to adopt new EU whistleblowing legislation, or risk UK whistleblowers being left behind with out-of-date legislation. As the EU’s Whistleblowing legislation passes its final hurdle in the EU Parliament today (April 16), Protect, wants the same gold standard protections introduced in the UK. We want the government to keep its … Read more
Please note, our advice line will be closed from midday on Wednesday April 3 until Friday April 5 as we move offices. Moving day is 4 April to new sustainable offices at The Green House, Cambridge Heath Road, London E2 9DA. Protect’s new home is a shared space for charities and not-for-profit organisations in London. … Read more
Whistleblowers exposing illegal conduct or abuses of law in their workplace will soon have nothing to fear when revealing the truth, thanks to a new EU Directive to protect whistleblowers from retaliation. The EU law, once implemented, will see protection for whistleblowers in the public and private sector, including civil servants, the self-employed, shareholders and … Read more
Five well-known European whistleblowers wrote directly to EU Vice President Frans Timmerman and Commissioner Věra Jourová calling on them to ensure a new law to protect whistleblowers across all 28 Member States removes any doubt that whistleblowers are protected for going directly to the competent authorities. The whistleblowers – Antoine Deltour (multinational tax avoidance schemes … Read more
Protect’s Head of Policy Andrew Pepper-Parsons attended the OneEducation Safeguarding conference in Manchester on 8 February to deliver a whistleblowing workshop for those tasked with overseeing or running safeguarding procedures within schools. Delegates were fairly expert on safeguarding and knew the appropriate way to handling a safeguarding issue raised with them, but my workshop emphasised … Read more
Protect is calling for a shake-up of UK regulatory bodies with enforcement powers, calling on them to ‘step up’ and better regulate the industries they monitor. Head of Policy at Protect, Andrew Pepper-Parsons, said, “Too many of our callers who approach their regulators find a dead end for their concerns, or receive stony silences instead … Read more
Whistleblowers play a key role in exposing corruption, public safety scandals and unethical behaviour. Unfortunately, all too often they can suffer fear, silence, and loneliness just from telling the truth. Protect, along with our partner, WIN (Whistleblowing International Network) is supporting the campaign #TruthNeedsFriends by the Green/EFA Group in the EU Parliament which hopes to … Read more
A governance report into local authorities by the National Audit Office (NAO) has found one in six councils do not have their whistleblowing policies easily available on their websites, and of the policies that the NAO could find – 24% were out-of-date. The report, Local Authority Governance, published 15 January, acknowledged the challenges facing local … Read more
