Commission adds phone number to whistle-blowing advice

The Charity Commission has added a phone number to its advice on reporting serious wrongdoings in a charity. The number is for specialist whistleblowing charity Protect, and is a free and confidential advice line, available on: 0800 055 7214. Protect can help explain what types of wrongdoing you can report, and your legal rights.   https://twitter.com/WhistleUK/status/1135591424643162112   The Charity Commission’s ‘Report serious wrongdoing at a charity as a worker or volunteer’ guidance aims to inform people about what sort of wrongdoing can be reported to the Commission, and how to do so. If someone does want to report an incident, the guidance advises them to email whistleblowing@charitycommission.gov.uk and within the email, to answer a series of questions. In a recent blog on the subject, Charity Commission CEO Helen Stephenson said that the Commission was piloting the phoneline, which it would be closing monitoring to evaluate its impact on the experience of charity whistleblowers and on the amount and quality of intelligence it provides. According to Stephenson, the Commission is also testing a new service that will see it phone each whistleblower directly to discuss the concerns they have raised, and provide a direct point of contact should they need to speak to it further as the Commission takes the matter forward. In the blog, she says: "We want to make it easier for charity workers and volunteers to draw serious concerns about their charity to our attention. "We know that the decision to blow the whistle can be difficult for the individual because of the tensions it creates over their loyalty to the organisation and their own livelihood and status. "That’s why we’ve been significantly upgrading our support for potential whistleblowers."    

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