Home | Databases | WorldLII | Search | Feedback Edited Legal Collections Data

Vandekerckhove, Wim --- "European Whistleblower Protection: Tiers or Tears?" [2010] ELECD 543; in Lewis, B. David (ed), "A Global Approach to Public Interest Disclosure" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2010)

Book Title: A Global Approach to Public Interest Disclosure

Editor(s): Lewis, B. David

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781848448995

Section: Chapter 3

Section Title: European Whistleblower Protection: Tiers or Tears?

Author(s): Vandekerckhove, Wim

Number of pages: 21

Extract:

3. European whistleblower protection:
tiers or tears?
Dr Wim Vandekerckhove

INTRODUCTION

Perhaps the most obvious purpose of whistleblowing legislation is to
protect the whistleblower from retaliation by the employer or others.
However, such legislation might also have other purposes. For example,
facilitating or encouraging the raising of concern about malpractices at
work, making recipients of such concerns obliged to investigate suspected
wrongdoing, or ensuring that the wrongdoing is dealt with. This chapter
offers an assessment of whistleblower protection in Europe. All 27 coun-
tries of the European Union (EU) are included except for the UK, which
is discussed in another chapter in this book. Switzerland, although not
a member of the European Union, is also included, and the position of
the whistleblower within the European institutions is also discussed. The
assessment is made against a `three-tiered model' derived from the UK
Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998 (PIDA). Although the sole stated
purpose of the UK PIDA is to protect the whistleblower, I argue that the
successive recipient tiers make previous tiers accountable for investigating
and dealing with suspected wrongdoing, thereby serving other purposes
than mere protection. As protection often takes the form of creating a
ground to claim compensation for the retaliation suffered ­ and not, for
example, granting the right to reinstatement ­ these secondary purposes
should not be underestimated.


THE THREE-TIERED MODEL

One of the reasons the UK PIDA is an important piece of legislation is
that it consolidated an important consensus that had been growing since
the ...