Whistleblowing Protection in Australia Essay Example

of legislation that prevents the employers from dismissing or otherwise taking detrimental action against the whistleblowers. However, under the Corporations Act, one is protected as a whistleblower if he or she is an employee, an officer, a person who has a contract to supply products to a company, or an employee of the person that has acontract to supply goods to a given company. Under this act, if these groups of people make disclosures that qualify for protection the whistleblower will not be subject to any criminal or civil liability. In addition, no contractual remedy can be enforced against the individual based on this kind of disclosure. The Act also makes the victimization of such individuals a crime.
As a result, the Act sanctions actions to be brought forward against those individuals that retaliate against the whistleblowers.

In 2013, the Commonwealth’s Public Interest Disclosure Act, 2013was passed. However, this act focused too much on the public sector and ignored the private sector. According to the National Director of Policy and Publishing Judith Fox, “the shortcomings in the current regime for the private sector whistleblowing is that it is very narrowly focused.” The protection only relates to the violations of the companies legislations and not to the other legislations. For instance, the whistleblower needs to the employee of the company in question and not its subsidiary. In addition, the Act only allows for the disclosures that are made to the ASIC, directors, or secretaries, and the senior management.

Miceli and Near conducted a study on whistleblowing from a sample of employees in Australia, United States, and Norway. The study revealed that 22% of whistleblowers in Australia perceived negative treatment

or retaliation from the management while the US had 17%, Norway less than 8%. These findingsclearly indicates that whistleblowers face more retaliation from the management than the other countries. As a result, more employees would prefer to keep quite instead of disclosing irregularities due to fear of victimization.

Whistleblowers play a very critical role in the identification and therefore stopping of the misconduct within the corporate sector. In additional to the normal reporting channel, whistleblowing offers a way to facilitate the flow of information. The information provided by the whistleblower may bring to light the matter that the board may not be aware of. Therefore, can fulfill a critical role as a “corporate governance tool.” Therefore, whistleblowingis a vitally important aspect of the corporations’ overall compliance with the regulation and the detection of misconduct.

Whistleblowers have played a very significant role in uncovering the problems in the Australian Corporate failures. Whistleblowers have had a role in the collapse of corporations such as One.Tel, HIH, and WA Inc. The whistleblowers were able to point out the irregularities within the corporation. Such information was critical in accelerating the collapse of such corporations that had a lot of irregularities. The role played by Whistleblowers in the collapse of these high profile collapses has resulted in increased attention for theprotection of corporate whistleblowers. One of the latest efforts has been a Senate Report that is heavily criticizing the corporate whistleblowing regulation that exists in Australia (Brand & Lombard, 2015). Many stakeholders feel that the protection is very narrow.

This kind of protection is inadequate and a provision should be established that will define the disclosable conduct to include the conduct that goes

against the Commonwealth law and other relevant foreign laws. In addition, the whistleblower needs to be protected fully, regardless of the regulatory body they disclose irregularity to. This means that the regulator should be allowed to disclose irregularities to ACCC, ASIC, APRA, AFP, ATO, and any other relevant regular.

Furthermore, the Whistleblower do not need to be knowledgeable of the applicable regulatory and legal framework so as to know which regulatory authority they need to make the disclosure to so as to qualify for the protection. For instance, the whistleblower does not need to know that the irregularity is a breach of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010, or the Corporations Act 2001 before he or she can disclose the information.

There are a number of reforms that Australia can adopt from other jurisdiction. In the United States and the United Kingdom, there is a provision for allegations of misconduct that are made in good faith. Such kind of allegation does not attract retribution.
Australia should support, this approach rather the kind of approach that inserts the same kind of provision in multiple different pieces of legislation. Australia can also adopt the US-style bounty system that rewards corporate whistleblowers. A reward based style while more likely increase the incidences of whistleblowing. The whistleblowers will undoubtedly lead to an increase in the number of whistleblowers who will be wiling to disclose irregularities. This will ensure that the corporation’s fraud detection systems, as well as reporting policies, are improved. It will be critical in the containment of irregularities in corporations.

Therefore, it is clear that the corporate whistleblower regulation in Australia is not strong enough. There is no single regulation that

protects the whistleblowers in Australia like other countries. As a result, many employees in Australia are reluctant to disclose irregularities within corporations as they are afraid of retaliation. Therefore, Australia should adopt some corporate whistleblower protection from countries such as the United States and the United Kingdom. Such regulations will be able to increase the instances of whistleblowing given that whistleblowing plays an important role as a corporate governance tool.

Event Promotion

Even promotion involves the application of the project management to the management of events, festivals, and conferences. It involves the identification of the target audience, planning the logistics, and coordination of the aspects of launching the event. The event should ensure that there is enough return on the capital invested so as to make profits. There are different types of business organizations that are used in the entertainment industry to promote events and gain finances. This kind of business is exposed to a lot of risks that may result in the collapse of the business and therefore the business people are supposed to vigilant in promoting themselves against such inherent risks.

There are different types of business model in the event promotion sector. The event promoters typically are hired as independent contractors. Some venues normally have anexclusive arrangement with a given single promotion company. Other venues work with different multiple promoters on different schedules. In many instances, the promoters may also work together with each other. This may be either through partnerships where the different promoters may have equal stake in the business. In other instances, some the event promoters may work together as subcontractors where one promoter subcontracts other event promoters to help in the

promotion of a given event. Other event promoters work independently on their own to promote events.

With the rise of social media, the scope of event promotion has widened. Today bloggers and other people who have a huge following on the social media such as twitter, and Instagram consider themselves as event promoters too and charge fees for their promotion services. In addition, many celebrities have come to act as their own concerts. Such individuals also make use of social media as they always have a huge following on social media and are in a position to promote their own events. Event promoters earn revenue through the fee that they charge for their services as well as loyalties. Normally, the fee structure is a usually a simple percentage of the ticket fee or the drinks and food sales. Just like any other business, variation in the fee structure exists such as the maximum and minimum allowances. Some event promotion companies may also enter into contracts with the venues and may, therefore, receive some form of fixed income in addition to the commissions and other fees they charge.

In this case, the promoter is assured of some of income. There inherent risks within the event promotion event. There are always disputes over money in the event promotion business because the business largely based cash. The event promotion industry has a long history of corruption with inaccurate bookkeeping. To solve this risk, the business people should make sure that recording keeping is accurate. Clear guidelines should be put in place so that both the promoter and the promoted can work together in keeping records to avoid disagreements.
The promoters may

also demand some advance payments so as to make sure that part of their promotion costs are at least covered in the event that there are disagreements. This minimizes loses that the promoter can incur.

Promotion business may also be faced with the risk of being insolvent due to high expenses incurred without corresponding revenue. In other words, the revenue may not meet expectations and in the end may be liquidated. Therefore, the promoters should be vigilant in their expenses and revenue predictions so that revenue predictions are not overstated.Another risk that there is always a possibility that the event will be canceled even after a significant amount of effort and resources has been used in promoting the event. To protect themselves from such losses, the event promoters should include clauses in their contracts that make it mandatory for them to be paid their promotion fee even if the event is canceled. Generally, the promotion industry, if faced with a lot of risk and the promotors, should be vigilant in selecting their clients and avoiding losses through liability contracts.

Bibliography

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“Promoting and Marketing Events: Theory and Practice” (London: Rouledge2013).