In March 2024, the House of Whistleblowers published its annual report for 2023. Last year, the House received more inquiries and also more reports from whistleblowers. This is consistent with international trends.
In its 2023 annual report, the House of Whistleblowers (hereinafter referred to as “House”) reported that it received 369 new requests for advice in 2023, a 50% increase over 2022. In doing so, the House points out that when reporters ask the House for advice, they often already have a conflict with the employer. Last year, this included questions from new groups of workers, such as self-employed workers, who are now also protected under the Whistleblower Protection Act. Remarkably in addition, also from executives at companies, who felt restricted from raising abuses themselves. You would say that the speak-up culture at those organizations could be improved a bit.
So the subject does begin to come alive more. For example, in 2023, about 50% more requests for information from employers came to the House. The number of individuals who requested an investigation of wrongdoing or prejudice increased from 11 to 17, which is also a significant growth. At the same time, it is only a fraction of the number of reports believed to be filed annually in the Netherlands, see below.
Furthermore, we noticed that about 50% of the requests for advice involving wrongdoing came from the semi-public sector. Considering the share of this sector in the Dutch economy, that seems rather a lot to us. According to the House, last year many inquiries came mainly from the healthcare sector and additionally from academia. When the House actually deploys an advisory process in response to suspected wrongdoing, there is often prejudice. However, the vast majority of the number of requests for an investigation came from the public sector; surely this is also noteworthy. Could it be that the social interest is more quickly at stake in government? Are people in the public sector just a little better informed about the new law and the role of the House? Or is there something wrong in the (semi)public sector? The problem with these kinds of statistics is always that they are open to many interpretations.
The House experience echoes findings from a report by Navex. They are believed to be the largest provider of whistleblower software in the world. Through their software, nearly 2 million reports are submitted to employers each year. Each year, Navex calculates the median number of reports per 100 employees using a – sometimes somewhat arbitrary – calculation method. In Europe excluding the United Kingdom, there was an increase from 0.53 to 0.63 reports per 100 employees in 2023. That’s an increase of nearly 20%. This may be the effect of the implementation of the EU directive to protect whistleblowers in the various member states. Incidentally, the median number of reports worldwide is 1.57. In Western Europe, there is simply considerably less frequent reporting than in countries such as the United States or India; this is also our experience. Cultural factors play a role. Some 50 to 60 percent of reports involve undesirable behavior, and just under half of the number of reports are eventually declared “proven. This suggests that it makes sense to report; most organizations that purchase software to receive and handle reports take whistleblower reports seriously.
Incidentally, internationally it is quite common for reports of undesirable behavior to be made through the central reporting office. In the Netherlands, this is not always the case yet. In the context of the Whistleblower Protection Act, we do support a single central reporting office, because otherwise it’s hard to see if there is a structure or a pattern and if multiple employees are affected by this behavior. Mariëtte Hamer, the government’s commissioner for sexually transgressive behavior, also points this out in her handout. More on this in the next newsletter.
Unfortunately, no figures specific to the Netherlands have been published. But if these are somewhat in line with the EU average, which is our experience, then there should be tens of thousands of reports annually in the Netherlands. Only a very small proportion of these reporters contact the House. That may mean that many reports are simply handled well. Or that the House still needs to work a bit on its prominence in the private sector.
Then we read something special in the House annual report. The House finds it striking that not all confidants who approached the House had the necessary basic knowledge about reporting suspected wrongdoing. Since confidants often assist, inform and advise reporters, this does need to be addressed to reduce the risk that potential reporters receive misinformation. We are therefore pleased to report that our course “Whistleblower Protection Act in Practice” has now been accredited by the National Association of Confidential Advisors for continuing education of confidential advisors.
Want to know more about protecting whistleblowers? Then take our Whistleblower Protection Act course in practice. We also offer the course in-house and in English.
