Click to expand Image Australian Parliament in Canberra at sunrise. © Kinson C Photography via Getty Images (Sydney, July 30, 2025) – The Australian government should create a dedicated Whistleblower Protection Authority to support and protect public-interest whistleblowers, Human Rights Watch said in a recent submission to the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee of the Australian Senate.Since February 2025, the committee has been considering the proposed Whistleblower Protection Authority Bill 2025. It would create such an authority, which would provide information, advice, assistance, guidance, and support to whistleblowers and potential whistleblowers. The authority would also investigate the mistreatment of whistleblowers and make recommendations for the enforcement of civil penalties. The committee’s final report is expected on August 29, 2025.“Public interest whistleblowers risk their jobs, reputations, and sometimes even their personal safety to expose corruption and human rights abuses,” said Annabel Hennessy, Australia researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Creating a Whistleblower Protection Authority would be an important step toward providing whistleblowers in Australia with the legal protections they need.”Current laws have failed to protect whistleblowers, Human Rights Watch said. Despite research finding that eight out of ten whistleblowers face some form of reprisal at work, there has been just one case in the past three decades in which an Australian whistleblower has received court-ordered compensation for the harm they experienced. The bill, if adopted, will help protect whistleblowers from retaliation for disclosures that are made in the public interest.The United Nations special rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders, Mary Lawlor, warned in 2021 that whistleblowers around the world are often in severe danger when they expose corruption. She said existing safeguards to protect whistleblowers were often weak or non-existent and that countries should do more to implement laws to protect them.“Human Rights Watch and other human rights groups have long called for Australia to introduce safeguards to protect journalists, rights activists, lawyers, whistleblowers, and others making disclosures in the public interest,” Hennessy said. “The Whistleblower Protection Authority Bill would offer whistleblowers in Australia critical safeguards to help protect everyone’s rights.”