INTRODUCTION
The Legislative Decree 24/2023, which regulates the protection of persons who report breaches of national or European Union law that harm the public interest or the integrity of the public administration or the private entity, of which they have become aware in a public or private employment context, brings together in a single legislative text the entire discipline of reporting channels and of the protections afforded to whistleblowers in both the public and private sectors. The result is an organic and uniform regulation aimed at providing greater protection for whistleblowers. Legislative Decree no. 24/2023 represented, in fact, an opportunity to overcome the regulatory differentiation typical of the whistleblowing matter, which until now had been regulated, for the public and private sectors, respectively, by Legislative Decrees no. 165 of 20 March 2001 (Article 54-bis) and no. 231 of 8 June 2001 (Article 6, paragraphs 2 and 3). 231 (Article 6, paragraphs 2-bis et seq.), as well as by Law No. 179 of 30 March 2017 (which rewrote Article 54-bis, introduced paragraphs 2-bis, 2-ter and 2-quater in the aforementioned Article 6 and provided, in Article 3, for the integration of the regulation of the obligation of office, business, professional and industrial secrecy).
PURPOSE OF THE PROCEDURE
The purpose of this procedure is to regulate the management of the reporting of irregularities, outlined below, in compliance with the provisions of Legislative Decree 24/2023, by adopting appropriate measures to provide and guarantee to the reporter the necessary protection against possible cases of retaliation or actions taken as a result of the report, denunciation or disclosure that have caused him/her unjust damage.
RECIPIENTS
The scope of application of the procedure for the management of reports includes all the activities performed by Vero Project, and is addressed as recipients to the following subjects
– to employed workers (including fixed-term workers, workers with part-time employment contracts, workers on staff leasing contracts, workers on apprenticeship contracts, referred to in Legislative Decree 81/2015 and workers with occasional performance contracts)
– to self-employed workers and holders of coordinated and continuous collaboration relationships pursuant to Article 409 of the Italian Civil Code, as well as holders of collaboration relationships ‘organised by the principal’, pursuant to Article 2 of Legislative Decree 81/2015
– to workers or collaborators who supply goods or services or perform works for third parties;
– to freelancers and consultants;
– volunteers and trainees, including unpaid ones;
– shareholders and persons with functions of administration, management, control, supervision or representation, even if they perform such functions on a purely de facto basis.
MANAGEMENT OF REPORTING CHANNELS
Vero Project, following the provisions of Legislative Decree 24/2023, has set up as a reporting channel a platform that, by means of encryption tools, guarantees the reporter the possibility of making a report anonymously using the following link:
https://veroproject.segnalachi.it/
The reports governed by the above-mentioned decree concern
– administrative, accounting, civil or criminal offences;
– unlawful conduct relevant under Legislative Decree 231/2001, or violations of the organisation and management models provided for therein;
– offences falling within the scope of application of European Union or national acts relating to the following areas: public procurement; services, products and financial markets and prevention of money laundering and terrorist financing; product safety and compliance; transport safety; environmental protection; radiation protection and nuclear safety; food and feed safety and animal health and welfare; public health; consumer protection; protection of privacy and protection of personal data and security of networks and information systems;
– acts or omissions affecting the financial interests of the Union;
– acts or omissions affecting the internal market;
– acts or conduct that frustrate the object or purpose of the provisions of Union acts.
The report may be made at any time and may refer to facts that have occurred or are occurring. The person making the report must provide all the elements necessary to allow the Head of the entrusted Function (Supervisory Board) to proceed with the due and appropriate checks and verifications to ascertain whether the reported facts are well-founded. The content of the reports must be precise and consistent.
To this end, the report must contain the following elements:
– Generalities of the person making the report, indicating the position or function held within the organisation;
– A clear and complete description of the facts being reported;
– Circumstances of time and place in which they were committed;
– Other elements making it possible to identify the person(s) who has/have committed the reported facts;
– The indication of other persons who can report on the facts being reported;
– The indication of documents that may confirm the validity of such facts;
– Any other information that may provide useful feedback on the existence of the reported facts.
In the event of doubts as to the interpretation of events or situations that might represent a corrupt act, the Supervisory Board may be contacted.
All the Reports received are, in fact, subject to verification by the Supervisory Board in order to understand whether the communication received is accompanied by the necessary information to preliminarily verify its groundedness and to be able to initiate the subsequent in-depth investigation activities.
The management and verification of the validity of the circumstances represented in the reports are entrusted to the Supervisory Board, which does so in compliance with the principles of impartiality and confidentiality, carrying out any activity deemed appropriate.
The Supervisory Board entrusted with the management of the internally identified reporting channel performs the following activities
issues the reporting person with acknowledgement of receipt of the report within seven days from the date of receipt;
maintains contact with the reporting person and may ask the latter for additional information, if necessary;
diligently follows up the reports received;
provides feedback to the report within three months from the date of the acknowledgement of receipt or, in the absence of such notice, within three months from the expiry of the seven-day period from the submission of the report;
EXTERNAL REPORTS
The external reporting channel is entrusted to the ANAC, which, with the entry into force of the legislative decree in question, will also be able to receive and will have to manage external reports from persons belonging to the private sector. Reports which, pursuant to Article 6, may be made upon the occurrence of one of the following conditions
– in the absence of provision for or activation of an internal reporting channel in the relevant work context, or in the presence of a reporting channel that does not comply with the provisions of Article 4 of the aforementioned decree
– in the event that the report made through the internal reporting channel is not followed up;
– where the whistleblower has reasonable grounds to believe that making an internal report would go unheeded, or could give rise to the risk of retaliation;
– if the whistleblower has reasonable grounds to believe that the breach may constitute an imminent danger to the public interest.
As in the case of internal reporting, ANAC must also activate a channel for external reporting that guarantees the confidentiality of the reporter, the person involved and the person mentioned in the report, as well as the content and documentation attached to the report (Article 7(1)).
The platform is available at the following link: https://whistleblowing.anticorruzione.it
External reports are submitted in writing, through the above-mentioned IT platform, or orally, through telephone lines, voice messaging systems or meetings with the staff in charge (Article 7(2)).
Should the external report be submitted, by mistake, to a person other than the ANAC, the person receiving it is obliged to transmit it to the latter within 7 days, notifying the reporter (Article 7(3)).
The procedures for handling external reports, specifically identified by Art. 8, are substantially superimposable on those relating to the management of internal reports, with the difference that, in this case, ANAC is expressly required to notify the reporting party of the final outcome of the procedure, which may also consist in the filing of the report, in a recommendation or in an administrative sanction, or in its transmission to the competent authorities (administrative or judicial, including EU institutions, bodies or organisations), which will have to manage the report in accordance with the procedures set out in Article 8(1).
The latter occurs in cases where the report concerns information on breaches that do not fall within the competence of ANAC.
ANAC also provides for the annual transmission to the European Commission of information on the number of external reports received, the number and types of proceedings initiated as a result of the reports, with an indication of their outcome, as well as on any ascertained financial damage resulting from the reported breaches (Article 8.3).