Understanding the role of an independent whistleblower hotline service - Stopline.

Understanding how a disclosure report or a complaint is managed through a service like Stopline is important. The role of an independent whistleblower service is to provide the disclosing person with the ability to make a report for a number of reason, those being;

• you feel uncomfortable or embarrassed talking to someone at work about the problem or concern or issue you are facing;

• you need to be anonymous when disclosing information;

• you cant speak to your supervisor or manager about the issue for any reason because it may involve them.

A whistleblower program is a process whereby a person can make a report independent to their employer confidentially and with total anonymity (where possible). Stopline is an independent company, so our team is able to provide you with a voice to discuss your concern or workplace issue openly, knowing that we will (where possible) provide you with some guidance (based on your company's policies and procedures, about how to make the report and who and where the report will be managed internally.

Please note that Stopline will not provide legal advice.

A service such as Stopline does not have any jurisdiction with the business and does not have any influence or oversight of the disclosure report once it is submitted to the business, your employer.

What we do is provide the support and avenue to report matters anonymously, where possible. However, workplace incidents such as bullying and harassment, are not always able to be reported anonymously because these types of matters are usually confined to a selected few people, and the people who are involved are all usually known by others.

Stopline will assist the reporting process with you, and will advise you IF such reports are able to be reported anonymously. Obviously the circumstances of the report and the persons involved will need to be taken into account before an anonymous report can be considered.

Another consideration with disclosing information in a confidential report for those seeking protections under the Corporations Act, (Treasury Laws Amendment (Enhancing Whistleblower Protections) Act, 2019 (the Act), “Are you an eligible whistleblower?”, as per the definition of an Eligible Whistleblower under the Act?

If you are not an eligible whistleblower as defined by the Act, then you may wish to speak with one of our team to understand how you can make a confidential report, ask where in the business does the report go and what is the process that the employer should follow once the report is submitted.

The Act and the ASIC Regulatory Guide 270 (which is easier to read) will provide you with all the information about being an eligible whistleblower and how to submit an anonymous report.

Stopline will be able to provide you with the information in a PDF directly from the ASIC website.