New whistleblower legislation will not protect many who have already made protected disclosures, a former prison guard turned whistleblower said.
Noel McGree, who made a number of protected disclosures about alleged wrongdoing in different facets of the Irish Prison Service in March 2016, said although he was thanked by the president and Public Expenditure Minister Michael McGrath for his input to the new Protected Disclosures (Amendment) Act 2022, signed into law by Michael D Higgins on Thursday, the new law will not benefit him.
Although the new act can be applied retrospectively, it may not apply to those who have already commenced legal proceedings, which Mr McGree already has.
And as someone has just six months to lodge a complaint with the Workplace Relations Commission, Mr McGree questioned how retrospective the act could ever really be.
Although a case he lodged with the High Court will not be heard until 2024 at the earliest, because it was filed before the new legislation was enacted, it will be tried under old whistleblower legislation.
“Overall, I’m feeling a bit let down and disappointed. Really, the new act is about future whistleblowers," he said.
But the protected disclosures act has got some things right, he said. One of these is reversing the burden of proof in civil proceedings so penalisation of the whistleblower is assumed until an employer shows otherwise.
“The reversal of the burden of proof is certainly positive but that only kicks in when a...
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