Australia needs tougher protections for those who blow the whistle on corruption.
Virtually every whistleblower faces retaliation, no matter whether they are in the public or private sector, or NGOs, and regardless of their position. Retaliation is the reflexive response of systems of power to those who embarrass or threaten them. A public profile is no protection. As the example of Brittany Higgins shows, a public profile may in fact dramatically widen the scope for retaliation, with partisan media companies deploying their capacity for public smearing and humiliation.
And public sector bodies can retaliate even more savagely than corporations or NGOs. As the case of Bernard Collaery demonstrated, the security and political establishment pursued vexatious prosecution seeking to jail him, abandoned the Commonwealth’s model litigant obligation and overrode the most basic principles of criminal justice to retaliate against him.
Politics Editor @BernardKeane
Bernard Keane is Crikey's political editor. Before that he was Crikey's Canberra press gallery correspondent, covering politics, national security and economics.
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