Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I am curious as to whether this is something ever sought by the Comptroller and Auditor General, not within the context of accounts, obviously, but people often bring forward information. Is the Comptroller and Auditor General made aware of such protected disclosures? There would also be a value in this committee writing to each Department and asking how many protected disclosures they have had. It would merit some attention. Not every protected disclosure will be found to be correct, but people are really putting their heads above the parapet. We must then interrogate whether those people who have brought protected disclosures forward are still in the jobs they were in before bringing forward information, which may have been of value in changing a workplace culture. I refer to bringing to attention of the Department how such issues have been dealt with and whether that has been done internally or externally.

Those are things we could meaningfully do as a committee, because this matter comes up repeatedly. It is a changing culture with respect to whistle-blowers and such actions being seen as a valuable compliance initiative. We must ensure that people are not being discouraged from coming forward because there have been so many examples of people being thrown under a bus as a result, as Deputy MacSharry said. There have been too many examples of that happening.