O Canada! In the free and glorious land of Trudeau, it’s not a crime to alter the lyrics of the country’s national anthem but safeguarding the rights of the whistle blowing heroes certainly is.
Trudeau’s Canada has been a target of much criticism for one or the other reason. This time it is the “Whistleblower” protection laws. Canada’s whistleblower protection laws are among the weakest in the world, tied with Lebanon and Norway. And, now even the European Court has acknowledged the same.
From the Panama Papers, to WikiLeaks, to Watergate, whistleblowers have been pivotal in revealing corruption and breaches of the public trust. For this reason, laws protecting whistleblowers are entrenched in every nation’s judicial fabric but not in Canada.
Whistleblower protection laws of Canada have received serious criticism from international watchdogs.
Whistleblower protection laws in Canada is still in effect as of the start of the 2023 legislative session, and there is no convincing government plan to change it any time soon. Meanwhile, a significant judgement from the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) demonstrates starkly how Canada’s democracy has regressed on this matter.
According to the Government Accountability Project, Lebanon, Norway, and Canada all have some of the lowest whistleblower protection laws in the world. The PSDPA was put into effect 17 years ago, but the project was particularly critical of the fact that just eight retaliation cases had been heard by the Public Servants Disclosure Protection Tribunal.
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Similar worries have been voiced by the Centre for Free Speech at Toronto Metropolitan University over the limited reach of Canadian legislation, the probability that the majority of complaints will be dismissed, and the entire process being “shrouded in impenetrable secrecy.”
The lack of protection for whistleblowers in the public and commercial sectors, as well as the emphasis on the handling of claims rather than the protection of whistleblowers, have prompted Transparency International Canada to urge for an update to Canada’s current framework.
It can be speculated that the Federal liberals fear the whistleblowers of exposing their crimes and corruptions. To stand up for what is right, and denounce what is harmful, unethical, illegal, and immoral requires great courage. And that courage stems from the whistleblower protection laws of Canada which are currently toothless under the Canadian government.
A study from the previous year, considered whether whistleblower laws protect identity, and protect against harassment, prevent gag orders and grant a ‘genuine day in court.’ Unfortunately, Canada failed on all counts.
International Bar Association also found in its survey that Canada is at the bottom of the list of countries with whistleblower protection laws.
In fact, just one out of 20 best practices are met by Canada, which places it behind top-nations like Ireland, the United States, and Serbia which are the top ranked ones. This includes transparency and review.
“Too often the rights that look impressive on paper are only a mirage of protection in practice,” the study said.
The study looked at whether whistleblower laws provided identity protection, harassment protection, protection from gag orders, and the right to a “real day in court.”
None of those indicators showed Canada as a success.
The federal Liberals were urged to “strengthen whistleblower protection for everyone in federal politics, including political employees, and in all federally regulated firms” in a statement released this week by Democracy Watch, a democratic accountability monitor.
Canada was criticised in the International Bar Association report for taking a long time to resolve cases and frequently deciding against whistleblowers. It referred to Canada’s 2005-enacted whistleblower regulations as being “almost fully dormant.”
“It takes tenacity and financial resources for any whistleblower to sustain a reprisal dispute for over six years, only to lose,” the report says.
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According to Democracy Watch, two Liberal legislations would ostensibly strengthen whistleblower safeguards. One, Bill C-65, aimed to make harassment safeguards stronger. Duff Conacher, the co-founder of Democracy Watch claims that this is covert and “far from optimal practice.”
The other, Bill C-86, was intended to establish safeguards for bank whistleblowers. Despite having been passed in 2018, Conacher claims that it has not yet been declared a law.
The government of Canada always remains at the centre of huge scandals. Be it the We Charity scandal or the ArriveCan, the Trudeau government has always been in a big spot of bother. Political whistleblowers are much needed heroes, as long as they speak the truth and do not try to sabotage and derail the system by spreading incorrect or slanderous information. They are needed badly in this free haven of the woketopian land. People who can put their butt in the line and expose the rampant corruption and crimes are very much needed in the country to expose the enemies of the nation.
