A detailed guide to the Act, including a list of Prescribed Regulators, is available from the DTI.

Summary of the Act
The Act came into force on 2nd July 1999. It encourages people to raise concerns about malpractice in the workplace and will help ensure that organisations respond by addressing the message rather than the messenger; and resisting the temptation to cover up serious malpractice.
Through protecting whistleblowers from dismissal and victimisation in the following circumstances, the Act promotes the public interest.

Malpractice
The Act applies to people at work raising genuine concerns about crime, civil offences (including negligence, breach of contract, breach of administrative law), miscarriage of justice, danger to health and safety or the environment and the cover up of any of these. It applies whether or not the information is confidential and extends to malpractice occurring overseas.

Individuals covered
In addition to employees, it covers trainees, agency staff, contractors, homeworkers, trainees and every professional in the NHS. The usual employment law restrictions on minimum length of service and age do not apply. The Act does not presently cover the genuinely self-employed, volunteers, the intelligence services, the army or police officers.

Legal Advice
The Act confirms that workers may safely seek legal advice on any concerns they have about malpractice.

Internal disclosures
A disclosure in good faith to a manager or the employer will be protected if the whistleblower has a reasonable suspicion that the malpractice has occurred, is occurring or is likely to occur. Where a third party is responsible for the matter this same test applies to disclosures made to it.

Disclosures to Ministers
Where someone in the NHS or a public body blows the whistle in good faith direct to the sponsoring Department, the disclosure is protected in the same way as an internal one.

Regulatory disclosures
The Act protects disclosures made in good faith to prescribed bodies such as the Health and Safety Executive, the Inland Revenue and the Financial Services Authority, where the whistleblower reasonably believes that the information and any allegation in it are substantially true.

Wider disclosures
Wider disclosures (e.g. to the police, the media, MPs, and non-prescribed regulators) are protected if, in addition to the tests for regulatory disclosures, they are reasonable in all the circumstances and they meet one of the three preconditions.

Provided they are not made for personal gain, these preconditions are that the whistleblower:

reasonably believed he would be victimised if he raised the matter internally or with a prescribed regulator, reasonably believed a cover-up was likely and there was no prescribed regulator; or had already raised the matter internally or with a prescribed regulator.

In deciding the reasonableness of the disclosure the tribunal will consider the identity of the person to whom it was made, the seriousness of the concern, whether the risk or danger remains, and whether it breached a duty of confidence the employer owed a third party.

Where the concern had been raised with the employer or a prescribed regulator, the reasonableness of its response will be particularly relevant.

Finally, if the concern has first been raised with the employer, it is relevant whether any whistleblowing policy in the organisation was or should have been used.

Exceptionally serious matters
Where the concern is exceptionally serious, a disclosure will be protected if it meets the test for regulatory disclosures and is not made for personal gain. The disclosure must also be reasonable, having particular regard to the identity of the person it was made to.

Full protection
Where the whistleblower is victimised in breach of the Act he can bring a claim to an employment tribunal for compensation. Awards will be uncapped and based on the losses suffered. Additionally where an employee is sacked, he may apply for an interim order to keep his job.

Gagging clauses
Gagging clauses in employment contracts and severance agreements are void insofar as they conflict with the Act's protection

This summary comes from Public Concern at Work. Public Concern at Work, founded in 1993, is the leading authority on public interest whistleblowing. Their charitable objectives are to promote compliance with the law and good practice in organisations across all sectors. In practical terms, they focus on the responsibility of workers to raise concerns about malpractice, and the responsibility of those in charge to investigate and remedy such issues.

Public Concern at Work Contact Details

Public Concern at Work
Suite 306
16 Baldwins Gardens
London
EC1N 7RJ

Telephone (for general calls and Helpline)

020 7404 6609.

It is considered good practice for every organisation to have their own policy in place on whistleblowing.