Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps he has taken to support his Department's staff who act as whistleblowers.

The Home Office has clear, well established Whistleblowing policy and process arrangements. Responsibility is shared between HR, which owns the policy, and HO Security & Investigations, who run the Nominated Officer network.

As the link between the individual raising the concern and the organisation, the Nominated Officers oversee the management of Whistleblowing cases and help the employees with raising their concern by providing advice independent from individual’s management chain.

In addition to Nominated Officers and the whistleblowing team, other internal channels of support available to individuals throughout the process include:

• the confidential whistleblowing helpline;
• Line mangers
• the Employee Assistance Programme (EAP)
• Home Office employee networks

The department operates several routes for employees to raise concerns, including a hotline, an inbox for emails and online form which ensures that individuals can remain anonymous if required. To ensure anonymity, all concerns are recorded centrally with the identity of the individual raising the concern not recorded alongside their concern.

The Home Office Raising a Concern including Whistleblowing policy is regularly promoted and referenced on the staff intranet and internal communication channels reminding staff of the routes available to raise concerns and signposting the support available to those individuals who raise a concern.