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| National Ombudsman Alex Brenninkmeijer |
Whistleblowers:
they reveal misconduct or illegal activities but they frequently end up facing
serious problems themselves. The Dutch Socialist Party (SP) has introduced a
bill to protect whistleblowers from the consequences of their revelations.
Dutch
whistleblowers have reported fraud and misconduct in a variety of workplaces
including safety issues at nuclear power plants, misconduct at employment
reintegration companies, fraud and price-fixing schemes in the construction
industry and substandard grenades being supplied to the military. For many, it
was a thankless task and Dutch whistleblowers have been victimised, dismissed
from their jobs, labelled as mentally unstable schizophrenics and political
criminals. Some have even been the targets of government prosecution. Many of
them have suffered from stress and it has had serious consequences for their
personal lives.
Isolated
A majority
of MPs in the lower house of parliament are in favour of the Socialist Party
bill protecting whistleblowers from threats, retaliation, discrimination,
suspension and dismissal. SP MP Ronald van Raak hopes that better protection
for whistleblowers will encourage others to report misconduct or illegal
activities, whether it is within a government department or within the
commercial business world:
"I'm
MP and it's my job to solve problems but I can only do that if I know about the
problems. I think that an awful lot of potential whistleblowers, people who
know about serious misconduct, are afraid to come forward. Whistleblowers have
come to me and told me things but only on condition that I not do anything else
with the information. There are afraid to get tangled up in the problems
they've seen come up elsewhere. People become socially isolated, they lose
their jobs, they end up in serious financial problems and sometimes they're
even declared mentally unfit."
There is a
whistleblowers’ hotline in the Netherlands and government institutions and
companies also have a dedicated advice and confidentiality person who is
available to hear complaints and reports on misconduct. However, the system
doesn't offer enough protection to whistleblowers.
Better
behaviour
The SP bill
will shield whistleblowers by anchoring protections securely within the law as
well as creating a new organisation, called the Whistleblowers’ Centre. The new
organisation, which will fall under the office of the National Ombudsman, will
be empowered to investigate cases. As soon as an employee is officially
recognized as a whistleblower, they will be protected from dismissal.
National
Ombudsman Alex Brenninkmeijer says the bill will change the way companies and
government departments treat whistleblowers: instead of sweeping a complaint
under the carpet and bullying an employee until they quit, companies will try
to investigate the issue. "As ombudsman I've had quite a lot of experience
with exposing dubious practices. Initially, this leads to indignation and anger
and but over the long term, companies and organisations start behaving
better."
Pariah
The
best-known Dutch whistleblower is Paul van Buitenen: he was a member of the
European Parliament for the Netherlands and the first person to speak out about
the fraud, corruption and mismanagement within the European Commission. His
whistle blowing led to the resignation of the entire commission. He was
rewarded by being suspended, his salary was halved and he faced disciplinary
action. He says he was treated like a pariah for revealing the corruption and
his family also suffered from his actions. He was eventually partially
rehabilitated and now he supports other whistleblowers.
There is
relatively little corruption in the Netherlands but over the years,
whistleblowers have shown that there is a culture of silence in the
Netherlands. MP Van Raak says the new law will end that and make the
Netherlands an example of transparency again.
Van Raak:
"This law is unique. If we can manage to pass this law then the
Netherlands will finally solve the problem of whistleblowers. We’ll no longer
bear the shame of treating people like criminals and lunatics just because
they're doing their civic duty. And then we’ll be an example to the rest of the
world. That's true even now; lots of other countries are interested and want to
know what we are doing with this bill because they want to learn from our
example."
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