So where are the whistleblowers?
Just seven council employees report wrongdoing over the past two years
Only seven employees have turned whistleblower on potential wrongdoing within Stirling Council over the last two years.
Audit committee members were told by officers yesterday (Thursday) that, given the nature of whistleblowing, it would not be appropriate for any detail to be publicly provided about any of the cases as it could lead to individuals or teams being identified.
However, committee chair, Tory councillor Neil Benny, said he was reassured by the small numbers.
From February 2018 until the end of December 2019, seven cases were reported and considered by the council’s monitoring officer under the policy.
This was in addition to two other referrals already under investigation when the whistleblowing policy was introduced.
One of the seven ‘new’ referrals had been subsequently freely withdrawn by the worker concerned.
Another was made by a third party and underlying matters were handled through other procedures and management actions.
A referral from a former member of staff was also judged not to amount to disclosure of wrongdoing and the individual concerned confirmed they had not been seeking an investigation when they submitted their email.
Investigative or other actions were taken, however, in relation to the four remaining new referrals during the period.
Three of the five [four new and one pre-policy] investigations have now been closed.
Outcomes included a number of improvement actions taken within a service, and the chief governance officer wrote formally to a relevant senior manager in another case. In the third it was concluded there was insufficient evidence to merit further investigation, although the subject matter would inform planned internal audit work.
Continuing dialogue is ongoing with the fourth case.
Another case is currently on hold pending provision of supporting information from an individual who indicated that they wanted to make a disclosure but has yet to do so.
Asked by Green councillor Alasdair Tollemache if there was a time limit on cases, particularly given a case predating February 2018 was still ongoing, chief governance officer Julia McAfee said the ball is still “potentially in the whistleblowers’ court”.
“I can give reassurance that these don’t just sit on our desk waiting for us to get round to them,” she added. “Some of the information may never be forthcoming. If it was a straightforward complaint it would have been closed long ago. We are conscious, however, that we want to facilitiate whistleblowing and while we could think we are not getting anything something could come in the following week.”
Tory councillor Martin Earl asked how existence of the policy was communicated to staff.
“There’s a mandatory training tool, but it’s a relevant point you raise and it may be useful to raise it on an annual basis,” replied Ms McAfee.
HR chief officer Kristine Johnson said she would ask for a whistleblowing information page to be set up on a staff online area. The council’s whistleblowing policy was approved in February 2018 and was developed to ensure compliance with the Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998.
Both the Act and the policy allow a worker to make a protected disclosure about a wrongdoing.
It will only be considered as protected if a number of factors apply, such as that the worker is acting in the public interest and not with a personal grievance or complaint.
The worker must also reasonably believe that the disclosure tends to show past, present or likely future wrongdoing in one or more of a range of categories including criminal offences, failure to comply with an obligation set out in law, miscarriages of justice, endangering an individual’s health and safety, damage to the environment, and deliberate concealment of any information relating to these categories