In addition to whistleblower legislation, would it be feasible to alter the guilty requirements for certain types of white-collar crime to a civil rather than the virtually unprovable criminal standard of proof? This should speed up the collection and presentation of evidence and reduce the duration and complexity of trials.
Letter published in the Irish Times on 27th May 2010.
RE whistleblower legislation
how will this work in practice? If you or I stand up and be counted and blow the whistle on X or Y-what are the chances of us securing gainful employment here again-many employers would not touch us with a barge pole.
It is ok for the body politic, with their parachute payments for loss of office and gold plated pensions to waffle on about this topic- funny though they never blow the whistle on anything themselves as they shuffle like sheep through the voting lobbies on each vote
We don't have real WB legislation in this country - that is the problem - and we have treated WBs very badly. The UK's WB system seems to work fine. In the US, blowers can receive a reward and seem well protected. In white collar crime, WB is very often the only way to secure a conviction. See Transparency Ireland for more info.
On politicians, they usually behave like sheep and just follow the party line. There have been very few stand-out politicians over the past century.