Making a whistleblowing policy work - Chair's statement

You only have to look at my Committee’s work on everything from GP out of hours services to tax avoidance to see how vital whistleblowers are to protecting taxpayers’ money. It is extremely worrying therefore that half of workers stay silent about misconduct, possibly because they fear what will happen if they speak out. Government must do more to support those workers that try to protect taxpayers’ money.

Government’s uncoordinated, piece-meal approach to whistleblowing is simply not good enough and it is completely unacceptable that almost two-thirds of those who speak out receive no response at all from their management.  The longer this goes on, the more likely it is that patterns of wrong-doing will be missed- undoubtedly resulting in taxpayers’ money being mis-spent or even lives being put at risk. I look forward to discussing this further when Government officials give evidence on 24 March.

Relevant information:

National Audit Office report: Making a whistleblowing policy work