Organisation information
What we do
From Office of the Protected Disclosures Commissioner (OPDC)
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The main role of Office of the Protected Disclosures Commissioner is to send reports of wrongdoing to the appropriate organisation for assessment and follow-up in accordance with the Protected Disclosures Act.
In certain circumstances, the Protected Disclosures Commissioner will consider a report of wrongdoing and follow it up if there is no other appropriate organisation.
The Commissioner can receive reports of wrongdoing:
- directly from a worker
- from a Minister, who is obliged to send it to the Commissioner within ten days of receipt or
- from a ‘prescribed person’ in certain circumstances.
The forwarding by the Commissioner of a report of alleged wrongdoing does not mean that the report constitutes a Protected Disclosure for the purposes of the Protected Disclosures Act.
You can send your report to us - the Office of the Protected Disclosures Commissioner - if having considered the options available, you are unclear, or do not know, who to make your disclosure to contact us . You can also use our downloadable form below to help you.
The Office of the Protected Disclosures Commissioner form
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In most cases, the Protected Disclosures Commissioner will forward your report of wrongdoing to the most appropriate prescribed person.
For a report to the Commissioner to be considered a protected disclosure you must meet the usual requirements and you must also reasonably believe that the information you disclose and any allegation you make is substantially true. We will check if there is an appropriate prescribed person to deal with your report and, where there is, we will send your report to them. We will not investigate what you say in your report or check whether or not it qualifies for protection before we send it to another person.
For more information on protected disclosures you can read:
If you wish to make a report orally, you can do so by using our dedicated telephone number: 01 639 5650
Telephone conversations are not recorded by this Office.
Ger Deering is the Protected Disclosures Commissioner.
Ger Deering is also the Ombudsman, the Information Commissioner and Commissioner for Environmental Information. As Ombudsman, Ger is also a member of the Standards in Public Office Commission and the Commission for Public Service Appointments.
Elaine Cassidy is the Director General of the Office of the Protected Disclosures Commissioner. Elaine is also the Director General of the Office of the Ombudsman.
Support services including ICT, HR, Finance, Communications and Legal are provided to the Office of the Protected Disclosures Commissioner by the Office of the Ombudsman.
All casework, decision-making and personal data collected through each element of our functions is kept separate and is accessed only by staff working in that area. This approach gives us functional independence in all our core work, but allows us to realise the benefits of scale of working for a larger organisation, by having access to specialist ICT, HR, Finance and Legal Services.