448. Deputy Claire Kerrane asked the Minister for Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation if the Government has assessed the effectiveness of the current protected disclosures framework where a safeguarding or operational concern involves more than one public body, including Tusla, the HSE, and An Garda Síochána; and the mechanism that exists to ensure that a cross-agency disclosure routed through the Office of the Protected Disclosures Commissioner is investigated as a cohesive, systemic issue rather than being fractured and returned to individual single-agency prescribed persons. [65253/26]

As the Deputy will be aware, Section 2A of the Protected Disclosures Act 2014 (as inserted by the Protected Disclosures (Amendment) Act 2022) states that:

"The Minister shall—

(a) not later than the end of the period of 5 years beginning on the date of the passing of the Protected Disclosures (Amendment) Act 2022 commence a review of the operation of this Act, and

(b) not more than 12 months after the end of the period referred to in paragraph (a) make a report to each House of the Oireachtas of the findings made on the review and the conclusions drawn from those findings."

My Department will be commencing this review in 2026 with a public consultation. I would encourage all stakeholders to participate in the consultation, the details of which will be published on my Department's website in due course.

All submissions, including the lived experience of 'whistleblowers' and the experience of recipients of reports in implementing the Act, will be given careful consideration and will feed into any resulting recommendations for improving the framework.

For the Deputy's information, the current role and functions of the Office of the Protected Disclosures Commissioner (OPDC) is set out in Sections 10A-10F of the Act. In accordance with the legislation, when the Commissioner receives a report of wrongdoing, he examines it to determine who is the most appropriate recipient to follow-up on the report. If, having examined it, he determines that there are issues raised in the report that are best addressed by more than one prescribed person, or other suitable person, he will transmit it to each of the recipients identified.

Reports are transmitted in their totality, but when they are transmitted to more than one recipient, the recipients are informed of this, as is the reporting person. The transmission will also specify which parts of the report the Commissioner considers to be within the remit of each recipient.

The recipients are reminded that the contents of the report and the identity of the reporting person have been disclosed to the other recipient(s) and they are advised to consider whether they need to communicate with the other recipient(s) to the extent that their considerations may overlap and to ensure effective communications are maintained with the reporting person.

The OPDC is independent and I, as Minister, cannot intervene in its operation or influence its decisions.

I trust this answers the Deputy's question.