Source: curia.europa.euย
The European Court of Justice (CJEU) has imposed significant financial penalties on Poland for its failure to transpose the EU Directive on Whistleblowing.
The Judgement establishes that Poland failed to adopt the necessary legislative measures to transpose the Directive by the deadline, and failing to inform the European Commission accordingly.
The Court imposed financial penalties including a lump sum of 7 million Euros and a daily penalty payment of 40,000 Euros until Poland complies with the Directive, plus costs.
Despite Poland’s claims of existing national provisions that align with the directive’s requirements, the court found that these provisions were insufficient and did not fully comply with the directive’s standards.
Marta Kozak-Maลnicka, PhD candidate in the Labour Law and Social Security Department at the University of Warsaw, said:
โFollowing this judgment, the current whistleblower protection Bill that has already been submitted to Parliament will be adopted quickly, and I suspect no major changes will be made to it during this parliamentary stage.
It is more likely that in two to three years, Poland will implement developments based on the evaluation of new whistleblowing law.
Such amendments to the law will be very welcome, as there are legitimate concerns about the effectiveness of the proposed approach.
It will be important for the Government to prioritise an educational campaign to raise awareness of the Polish general public of this law too, otherwise, whistleblower protection will remain on paper, and have little positive impact.โ