The new draft law on protection of whistleblowers has been published. We present a summary of the most important changes. 

• More entities required to implement an internal whistleblowing procedure. The obligation will be imposed on entities for which work is performed by at least 50 persons - thus, to reach the threshold not only employees (as was the case so far), but also all persons providing work on the basis of civil law contracts. The entity does not have to be an employer.
• Longer vacatio legis; private entities for which work is performed by at least 250 persons shall adopt an internal procedure within 1 month from the date of entry into force of the Act (in reality, they therefore have 3 months to adapt to the new requirements due to the 2-month vacatio legis). Private entities for which at least 50 and less than 250 persons work shall adopt the procedure by the 17th of December 2023.
• Deadline for consultation of the whistleblowing procedure with the social side, - these are to last no less than 7 and no more than 14 days from the presentation of the draft procedure to the social side.
• The catalogue of persons reporting or publicly disclosing information about violations of the law is expanded to include, among others, temporary employees, officers, professional soldiers.
• The whistleblower is to be protected not only from retaliatory actions, but also from attempts or threats of such actions.
• The internal procedure may provide for an "incentive system" for reporters.
• Data in the register of notifications are to be kept for 12 months (instead of 5 years as originally drafted).
• Some of the proposed penalties for offences, such as failure to implement the internal procedure, have been mitigated.

Want to know more contact us: Łukasz Kuczkowski, Janusz Tomczak, Ewelina Rutkowska.