On Thursday 7.12.17, the Government introduced the Treasury Laws Amendment (Enhancing Whistleblower Protections) Bill 2017 in the Senate.
The Bill is designed to create a single whistleblower protection regime in the Corporations Act, to cover the corporate, financial and credit sectors, and create a new whistleblower protection regime in the taxation law, to protect those who expose tax misconduct.
The Explanatory Memorandum to this Bill gives the following summary of the effect of this Bill.
2.12 Part 1 of Schedule 1 to this Bill consolidates the existing whistleblower protections and remedies for corporate and financial sector whistleblowers while strengthening and broadening these protections in a substantial way. Broadly the amendments f all into fou r categories:
the conduct that may be the sub ject of a disclosure that qualifies for protection and entities that can be the subject of such a disclosure;
• individuals who can make a qualifying disclosure;
• persons to whom a qualifying disclosure can be made; and
• remedies and processes available for whistleblowers.
The Table of Contents of the Bill is extracted below.
The Bill will replace the more limited ‘whistleblower’ protections in the Banking Act 1959; Insurance Act 1973; Life Insurance Act 1995 and the Superannuation Industry (Supervision) Act 1993 (SISA).
There is a Tax Month article on the draft legislation here. At that time the Minister summarised the changes as follows.
The reforms to the Corporations Act include:
- expanding the protections to a broader class of people;
- expanding the types of disclosures that will be protected under the framework;
- allowing disclosures to parliamentarians and the media in certain circumstances, if preconditions are satisfied;
- imposing new stringent obligations to maintain the confidentiality of a whistleblower’s identity;
- making it significantly easier for a whistleblower to bring a claim for compensation where he or she has been victimised;
- creating a new civil penalty offence so that law enforcement agencies will be able to take action against companies where the civil standard of proof can be met; and
- requiring all large companies to have a whistleblower policy in place, with penalties for failing to do so.
The new whistleblower protections in the taxation law are broadly consistent with the enhanced protections under the Corporations Act, and will facilitate disclosures about tax misconduct being made directly to the ATO.
[APH website – Bills Tracker; Bill; EM; LTN 235, 7/12/17; Tax Month Dec 2017]
Schedule 1 to the Bill
Contents
1 Short title ………………………….. ………………………….. ………………………1
2 Commencement ………………………….. ………………………………………….1
Schedule 1 — Amendments ………………………………………………………….3
Taxation Administration Act 1953 …………………………………………….21