Legal advice and whistleblowing

If you're considering blowing the whistle, you may have lots of questions about the legal protection available and how the law applies to the wrongdoing you are seeing. 

While our Whistleblowing team is not able to give you legal advice, organisations who can help and may be able to support you include: 

• Protect[1]
• trade bodies and unions
• ACAS [2]
• Citizens Advice[3]

You may also be able to get the help of a legal adviser, such as a solicitor.

How the law applies to whistleblowers

Whistleblowers are protected by the Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998 (PIDA), which means that you may obtain a remedy if you are hurt, suffer detriment or are dismissed because you have blown the whistle in the public interest. This is enforceable through an Employment Tribunal.

PIDA was introduced to encourage and give workers the legal support to speak up if they have concerns about wrongdoing in their workplace.

It makes provision about the subject matter of the disclosure, the motivation and beliefs of the worker, and the person(s) to whom the disclosure is made.

How the FCA helps whistleblowers

Whistleblowers can directly report wrongdoing to the FCA.

The FCA has a special ('prescribed') role under PIDA. Under PIDA, if a whistleblower makes a report to a prescribed person, such as the FCA, they will potentially qualify for the same employment rights as if they had made a report to their employer. If they do qualify, reporting to the employer directly is not required.

To qualify for these rights, as well as meeting the criteria found on GOV.UK[4], the worker must have a reasonable belief that: 

• the matter being reported falls within the remit of the prescribed person, as described in the second column of the Schedule to the Prescribed Persons Order headed 'Description of matters'. Find out more[5] 
• the information reported is substantially true

Read more about the role of 'prescribed persons'[6].

How whistleblowing information is shared

If you directly report wrongdoing to the FCA, we may share this information with relevant organisations.

We have agreements in place with many regulators and organisations so we can share information with them. This includes the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA), as we jointly regulate many firms. 

We also have agreements in place with the police and other law enforcement offices. We share information with them on a frequent basis, if we are legally allowed to do so. We may encourage you to contact these other organisations directly.

We always protect the identity of our whistleblowers. While we might have to share the information you have provided, we would not disclose that this originated from a whistleblower, unless we are legally obliged to.

FCA participation in Tribunals

We don't usually comment or participate in Tribunal proceedings brought under PIDA.