The term whistleblower refers to an employee of an administration who reports violations or irregularities committed to the detriment of the public interest to the bodies entitled to take action.
Reporting (so-called whistleblowing), in this perspective, is an act of manifestation of civic sense, through which the whistleblower contributes to the emergence and prevention of risks and situations detrimental to the administration to which he or she belongs and, by extension, to the collective public interest. Whistleblowing is the procedure designed to encourage reporting and protect, precisely because of its social function, the whistleblower.
The main purpose of whistleblowing is to prevent or solve a problem internally and promptly.
Article 1, paragraph 51, of Law 190/2012 (the so-called anti-corruption law) inserted a new article, 54 bis1, within Legislative Decree 165/2001, entitled "protection of the public employee who reports wrongdoing," by virtue of which a measure aimed at encouraging the emergence of cases of wrongdoing, known in Anglo-Saxon countries as whistleblowing, was introduced into our system.
The purpose of this document is to remove factors that may hinder or discourage the use of the institution, such as doubts and uncertainties about the procedure to be followed and fears of retaliation or discrimination.
There is no exhaustive list of crimes or irregularities that can be the subject of whistleblowing. Reports that concern conduct, risks, crimes or irregularities, whether consummated or attempted, detrimental to the public interest are considered relevant. Whistleblowing does not concern complaints of a personal nature of the whistleblower or claims/complaints that fall under the discipline of the employment relationship or relations with the hierarchical superior or colleagues, for which reference should be made to the discipline and procedures under the competence of the Personnel Service and the Single Guarantee Committee.
The whistleblower must provide all useful elements to enable the competent offices to carry out the due and appropriate checks and investigations to verify the validity of the facts being reported.{ Anonymous reports, i.e., lacking elements that allow their author to be identified, even if delivered through the methods provided for in this document, will not be taken into consideration within the scope of the procedures aimed at protecting the public employee who reports wrongdoing, but will be treated in the same way as other anonymous reports and taken into consideration for further verification only if they relate to facts of particular gravity and with a content that is adequately detailed and circumstantiated. This is without prejudice to the requirement that the facts or situations reported be true, for the protection of the whistleblower.
The Entity provides its employees and contractors with a software application accessible to employees through the intranet. The software application guarantees as per ANAC guidelines, absolute confidentiality and encryption of the reporter and the report, known only to the receiving party. Whenever the whistleblower holds the title of public official, the sending of the report to the aforementioned subjects does not exempt him/her from the obligation to report to the competent judicial authority the criminally relevant facts and hypotheses of fiscal damage.
The management and verification of the substantiality of the circumstances represented in the report are entrusted to the Head of Corruption Prevention, who shall do so in accordance with the principles of impartiality and confidentiality by carrying out any activity deemed appropriate, including the personal hearing of the reporter and any other persons who may report on the facts reported. To this end, the Head of Corruption Prevention may avail himself of the support and cooperation of the competent corporate structures and, if necessary, of control bodies external to the Entity (including the Guardia di Finanza, Provincial Labor Department, Traffic Police Command, Revenue Agency).
Except in cases where liability for libel and slander can be established under the provisions of the Criminal Code or Article 2043 of the Civil Code and in cases where anonymity is not enforceable by law, (e.g., criminal, tax or administrative investigations, inspections by supervisory bodies) the identity of the whisteblower is protected in any context subsequent to the report. With regard, in particular, to the context of disciplinary proceedings, the identity of the whistleblower may be disclosed to the disciplinary authority and the accused only in cases where: there is the express consent of the whistleblower; the disciplinary charge is based, in whole or in part, on the whistleblowing and the knowledge of the identity of the whistleblower is absolutely essential to the defense of the accused, provided that this circumstance is inferred and substantiated by the latter at the hearing or through the submission of defense briefs.
No form of retaliation or discriminatory measure, whether direct or indirect, affecting working conditions for reasons directly or indirectly related to the whistleblowing shall be permitted or tolerated against any employee who makes a report under this procedure. The employee's right to appeal directly to the Single Guarantee Committee, which will promptly notify the Head of Corruption Prevention.
This procedure is without prejudice to the criminal and disciplinary liability of the whistleblower in the event of slanderous or defamatory reporting under the Criminal Code and Article 2043 of the Civil Code. Any form of abuse of this policy, such as manifestly opportunistic reports and/or those made for the sole purpose of harming the whistleblower or other parties, and any other hypothesis of improper use or intentional exploitation of the institution that is the subject of this procedure, are also a source of liability in disciplinary and other competent fora.
