‘The Public Interest Disclosure Act, which introduced Part IVA and S.103A into the Employment Rights Act 1996, was regarded as pioneering, world-leading, legislation when it was passed in 1998. The importance protecting whistleblowers has become generally accepted in the years since then, not only in the United Kingdom but in Europe and beyond.. It is a reasonable assumption that a great deal of “whistleblowing” takes place each and every day which, before 1998, would not have occurred and it does so without any adverse action being taken against the “whistleblowers”. That is a massive cultural change for the better. PIDA and those who framed it must take a great deal of credit for it. However there is no longer a consensus that the legislative framework and the way in which it operates in practice is fit for the purposes of, on the one hand, ensuring that responsible whistleblowers are protected from retribution and, on the other, seeing that those wrongs or hazards to which responsible whistleblowers have drawn attention are remedied or prevented. Indeed Georgina Halford-Hall CEO Whistleblowers UK, writing in the Introduction to All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) Report “Making Whistleblowing Work for Society” said, “In 2020, PIDA is the equivalent of having teeth extracted without anaesthetic.” It is difficult to disagree. And in 2022 the orthodontic experience she was referring to is likely to be even more painful.’
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Littleton Chambers, 5th December 2022
Source: littletonchambers.com
