Whistleblowing Solicitors

You have the right not to be subjected to any disadvantage from your employer when you’ve made a protected disclosure.

This includes the right not to be unfairly dismissed or otherwise as a result of you blowing the whistle.

Other losses you may face once you have made a disclosure can include being demoted, being denied a promotion, receiving a pay cut, being harassed in the workplace or being set unrealistic targets.

It is your employer’s responsibility to ensure this does not happen as a result of whistleblowing.

In order to be protected, you must have ‘reasonable belief’ that a wrongdoing has occurred, or is likely to incur, and that it is not in the public interest.

The disclosure also needs to relate to statutory category of ‘failure’, namely:

• A criminal offence
• Abreach of legal obligation
• A miscarriage of justice
• A danger to health and safety
• Damage to the environment

There is no set period of employment required in order to make a whistleblowing claim.

Unfortunately, what counts as being in public interest is not defined and so is left to the employment courts to interpret this on a case-by-case basis.

There are relevant factors, however, which include the number of those who have been affected by the wrongdoing, the nature of the incident or occurrence, the nature of the interests affected and the prominence of the organisation at the centre of the allegation, i.e. if it’s a large corporate organisation it’s more likely to be in the public interest.