Last month I blogged about whistleblowing law and how it offers a legal remedy to those who suffer a detriment as a result of raising a concern at work. I talked about the Call for Evidence that the Government ran last year and promised to update you.
On 25 June 2014, we published our Government response. In it we talk in detail about the issues that were raised with us by over 70 respondents and list seven specific actions that the Government will take to address these.
Here is a quick summary of the seven actions:
- Many respondents to the call will be pleased to hear that we will be making changes to the law to improve transparency and consistency in the way prescribed persons handle whistleblowing disclosures. Prescribed Persons are the organisations that a person can go to to blow the whistle. This will be done through the Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Bill that was introduced in Parliament on 25th June 2014.
- We will be updating the “prescribed persons list”. This list has become out of date and we have identified a number of organisations that need to be added.
- We will widen the scope of the law to cover student nurses who can be in a position to witness wrongdoing in healthcare but may be concerned about the risk of losing their placement if they speak out about it.
- In addition to legal changes BIS will analyse the effectiveness of the referral system which takes information from an employment tribunal application form to notify the relevant organisation about a particular issue. We want to make sure that the relevant organisation is being informed about any malpractice that is uncovered by whistleblowers.
- We will be working with partners to deliver improved information and guidance for employers, including a code of practice, to guide them on how best to handle whistleblowing.
- We will revise current guidance for employees so that they better understand the steps they need to take to blow the whistle in the right way.
- Finally we will be exploring ways to share the stories of those employers who effectively embrace whistleblowing as a positive force within their organisations.
We hope you’ll agree that this is more progress by BIS to support whistleblowing in organisations. Please do let us know your views.
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