My Department is committed to fostering an appropriate environment for dealing with protected disclosures under the 2014 Act. In this regard, my Department has adopted the guidelines provided by the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform in processing any protected disclosure received. My Department has developed a draft set of guidelines for guidance in these matters and staff are encouraged to follow these procedures fully. My Department has also recently provided protected disclosure training to all staff managers and to staff deemed to be in public-facing offices throughout the Department.
Based on the information available at this time, I can confirm that there have been no protected disclosures received from staff in my Department in 2016 or to date in 2017.