NGOs from around the world have come together to urge the UK Government to strengthen its whistleblowing framework. In an open letter to the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, we call for the adoption of Clause 29 of the Employment Rights Bill – an amendment that would place a legal duty on employers to investigate concerns raised by staff and extend protections against unfair dismissal.
Whistleblowers are often the first to detect fraud, corruption, and safety failures. Protecting them is not only a moral obligation but an economic necessity. Early intervention saves money, lives and reputations. After decades of “lessons learned” but not acted upon, this government must ensure that the UK once again leads the way in whistleblowing protection.
In 2023, Protect significantly impacted the lives of thousands of whistleblowers by providing practical and legal advice on how to safely and effectively raise workplace concerns. The UK’s leading whistleblowing charity worked on 3047 total cases, a rise of 23% on 2022.
We welcome this National Audit Office report into whistleblowing in the civil service. The report notes that whistleblowers are key to good government and challenge is critical to holding organisations to account. Recent scandals, including Greensill and Partygate, showed that people inside government knew about wrongdoing but may have been afraid to come forward.
Josie Stewart, Foreign and Commonwealth Development Office (FCDO) whistleblower, who is bringing a claim that she was unfairly dismissed because she blew the whistle can’t rely on parts of her evidence because of Parliamentary Privilege.
As a member of the UK Anti-SLAPP Coalition we have been closely following the progress of the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act (ECB2) through Parliament. Now passed into law this is the first anti-SLAPP provision in UK law. While this is definitely a step in the right direction, there’s still much more that could and … Read more
