On\n26 November 2019, Directive of the European Parliament and Council no.\n1937\/0\/201, dated 23 October 2019, concerning the protection of individuals who\nreport breaches of EU law, therefore, concerning whistleblowing, was published\nin the Official Journal of the European Union. Of specific importance, the\nprovisions of the Directive are revealed, which include: \u2013 the creation of\nsecure reporting channels. In fact, it provides for the obligation of creating\nreporting channels within both public or private organisations with over 50\nemployees and within municipalities with over 10,000 inhabitants (Article 8); \u2013\na wide range of individuals protected by the Directive who are given the\nopportunity to make reports: (i) employees pursuant to Article 45, paragraph 1,\nof the Treaty of the Functioning of the European Union, including civil\nservants; (ii) self-employed workers pursuant to Article 49 of the Treaty on\nthe Functioning of the European Union; (iii) civil servants, shareholders and\nmembers of the administrative, management or supervisory body of a company\n(including non-executive directors); (iv) paid and unpaid volunteers and\ntrainees; (v) any person who works under the supervision and management of\ncontractors, subcontractors and suppliers; (vi) reporting persons, if they\nreport or disclose information on breaches obtained in the context of an\nemployment contract that has since terminated; (vii) reporting persons whose\nemployment contract has not yet started in cases in which information\nconcerning a breach has been obtained during the selection process or other\nstages of the pre-contractual negotiations (Article 4); \u2013 the support and\nprotection measures 1) of facilitators, 2) of third parties associated with the\nwhistleblower who could risk retaliation in a work context (e.g.: colleagues or\nrelatives of the whistleblower), 3) of the legal entities pertaining to the\nwhistleblower, for whom he works or with which he is otherwise associated in an\nemployment (Article 4). It concerns individuals who could also be subject to\nso-called “indirect retaliation” which takes place, for example, by\n“cancelling the provision of services, blacklisting or boycotting\u201d; \u2013 a\nhierarchy of reporting channels, prioritising and encouraging reporting via\ninternal channels and then resorting to external channels, which the public\nauthorities are required to set up (Articles 7 and 8); \u2013 the provision of a\nresponse deadline not exceeding 3 months of the report, a of the date of\nacknowledgement of receipt of the report, or, if no notification has been sent\nto the reporting person, three months as of the expiry of the seven-day\ndeadline from the making of the report (Article 9); \u2013 the scope of application\nof the new EU rules on whistleblowing to protect informants who also reveal\nbreaches a) in sectors such as that of public procurement, services, products\nand financial markets; b) in the prevention of money laundering and terrorist\nfinancing; c) in product safety and compliance; d) in transport safety; e) in\nenvironmental protection; f) in nuclear radiation protection and safety; g) in\nfood and animal feed safety and in the health and well-being of animals; h) in\nthe protection of public health; \u2013 the reversal of the burden of proof on\nindividuals who adopted damaging measures in judicial proceedings (Article 21);\n\u2013 exemption from liability due to the disclosure of information for the\nwhistleblower (Article 21). The purposes expressly provided for by the\nDirective are to guarantee effective protection of: \u2013 “informants”\nand, therefore, the categories of individuals who “although not dependent\non their work activities from an economic point of view, still risk being\nsubject to retaliation for having reported breaches. The forms of retaliation\nagainst paid or unpaid volunteers and trainees include: no longer using their\nservices, giving them negative job references, otherwise damaging their\nreputation or career prospects”; \u2013 “facilitators, work colleagues or\nrelatives of the reporting person who are under an employment contract with the\nreporting person’s employer or a customer of the latter or a recipient of the\nservices of the latter”; \u2013 trade union representative or labour\nrepresentatives if (i) they personally make a report as employees; (ii) they\nprovide the whistleblower with advice and support.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
On 26 November 2019, Directive of the European Parliament and Council no. 1937\/0\/201, dated 23 October 2019, concerning the protection of individuals who report breaches of EU law, therefore, concerning whistleblowing, was published in the Official Journal of the European Union. Of specific importance, the provisions of the Directive are revealed, which include: \u2013 the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[177,190,208],"tags":[1089,946],"class_list":{"0":"post-21485","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"hentry","6":"category-insights","8":"category-publications","9":"tag-dipendenti-en","10":"tag-whistleblowing-en"},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n