Exposing criminality at work is a moral act, but with whistleblower laws failing to protect those who speak up, lawyers are seeking novel solutions
“You’ll lose your mental health, your physical health, your family and your career by the time it’s over.”
Jeff Morris never returned to full-time employment after blowing the whistle that led to the 2017 royal commission into banking misconduct, but he now spends a lot of time advising – and warning – others who are considering going public with their own evidence of wrongdoing.
So why would anyone blow the whistle, given the costs? As Morris says, “It’s not something where you weigh up the pros and cons. You either do it because it’s the right thing to do, or you’re not made that way. Ninety-nine in 100 people that I talk to don’t go ahead for that reason. And that’s the problem, because it means that the amount of corruption that goes unexposed is enormous. But as long as whistleblowers aren’t protected…”
Whistleblowers are those among us who cannot walk past the wrongs they witness. Such people make the world a better, safer and more just place, to their own personal detriment. In Australia, whistleblowers have done more than all of our regulators combined to address corruption and expose wrongdoing: Richard Boyle is facing prosecution after shining a light on Australian Taxation Office malpractice; David McBride for exposing alleged Australian war crimes in Afghanistan; Bernard Collaery was pursued over revelations of...
NPR and NewsGuard tested six chatbots and four search engines with 30 questions built on false claims spread by Russia, China and Iran. The chatbots debunked the claims on average about three tim...