“Nine in ten whistleblowers experience retaliation,” according to the House of Whistleblowers Annual Report 2025. This insinuates that it’s best not to be a whistleblower. Is that accurate? Accoriding to us, no!
Recently, the House for Whistleblowers (the House) published its 2025 annual report. In 2025, 697 people who suspected wrongdoing at work contacted the House for advice. A significant increase from 2024. Since the Whistleblowers Protection Act entered into force, more and more people find the House. When the House was established in 2016, it received 531 requests for advice. This dropped to 208 in 2021. Since then, we have seen an annual increase again to the current 697 requests for advice. Are more people finding the House and receiving advice there? From what we hear in our practice about this, that may be true, although there is still room for improvement.
According to the annual report, nearly 90% of those 697 people report being disadvantaged. So is it better not to blow the whistle? We have been talking our heads off to correct this picture. Hereby some napkin math.
The Dutch workforce numbers 10.3 million people. According to software provider Navex, there are about 0.67 reports per 100 employees per year in Europe. That is consistent with our experience, so that should be 69,010 reports per year. About 0.87 percent of these reporters, according to Navex in Europe, indicate that there is retaliation. Again, that may well be true, and that should be 600. In other words, every reporter who is disadvantaged knows how to find the House!
Of course, this is not a scientifically sound calculation. But it is our experience that the vast majority of whistleblowers are not disadvantaged at all and we’ve been doing this work for about 20 years now. That’s not to say they all get vindicated, certainly not, so they’re not always satisfied, but reporters are rarely disadvantaged as a result of making a report.
In the media, we mostly see reports of cases that aren’t handled properly. This can give the impression that it’s better not to report incidents at all. In our view, this perception needs to be put into perspective. So please keep reporting!
The last part of the annual report contrasts sharply with the first part. In 2025, the House Research Department conducted only 29 new investigations regarding the treatment of reporters. For the past 10 years, they have published a research report on this subject about once a year. What about all those other people? Are they being protected effectively?
The percentage of aggrieved reporters is small and is probably around 1%. But harm as a result of a report should obviously not occur at all. How can that be achieved? See also our response to the EU consultation on the Whistleblower Protection Directive with some ideas. Tip of the hat:
- Require employers to launch anonymous reporting channels. After all, if you don’t know who the reporter is, you can’t disadvantage them.
- Give the House effective oversight and sanctioning powers.
Both of these elements are already in the Whistleblower Protection Act, but successive governments have unfortunately delayed the enactment of these amendments to the law that were passed by parliament. The ministry has announced that it will come up with an amended bill around the summer. We are excited!
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