ALBANIA
Albania’s Whistle-blowing is mandatory at work and is the reporting or disclosure of inappropriate behavior or wrongdoing of the employer. The labor inspection and State Labor Inspectorate law serves inter alia as a whistle-blower law for employees or work syndicates in Albania. Its main scope is securing the enforcement of the labor legislation through the State Labor Inspectorate (SLI).
Labor legislation in Albania includes mandatory whistle blowing service implemetation through:
• Conventions ratified by the Albanian Parliament addressing labor inspection, occupational safety and health, and labor inspection (agriculture)
• Labor laws addressing health and security at work, foreigners, collection of social security and health contributions, and social security services
• Respective bylaws
Any employee or the work syndicate (if there is one) has the right to complain in writing or verbally to the SLI if the employer demonstrates inappropriate behavior/wrongdoing and violates a provision of the labor legislation. The SLI must treat the complaint confidentially during its processing as well as during any inspection visit at the worksite.
Any employee/work syndicate can submit SLI claims related to the infringement/ breach of:
• Rights granted by the labor legislation such as the right to have equal treatment and non-discrimination at work
• The obligation of employers to include employees under the obligatory social security and health contributions scheme
• Health and security standards required at worksites
The whistle-blower can be anonymous and submit the claim online to SLI, which should respond to the whistle-blower within 10 days on the merits of the claim.
SLI can impose measures and formulate recommendations that should be met within the period of notice, or impose penalties if the infractions are very serious. If the entity does not improve the working conditions, the SLI may then suspend or stop the economic activity of that entity. Non-appealed inspection acts or confirmed decisions become executive titles, which are only delivered by the court.
The law does not mention specific protections granted to the whistle- blower except treating the claim with confidentiality.
As per the publicly available information published in the official website of SLI, during 2017, inspections initiated as a result of a whistle-blower complaint amounted to 3.3% of the total number of labor inspections at a national level.
Although there is an increase of inspections initiated as a result of a claim by 106 inspections during the period of January–August 2018, the rate of work complaints is still low. This can be attributed to the lack of training at work regarding the right to complain, to be protected and to be treated confidentially. Another reason for the low rate of whistle- blowing at work might be that the concept is a rather recent phenomenon, still to be tested in practice in a wide range of sectors.
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Country-by-country and EU whistle-blowing rules need to be taken into account in setting the best practices and policies in this growing area of risk, including what an employer must do when faced with a whistle-blower claim, such as whether an investigation is required, protections of the employee who complained of company practices and litigation issues.
Best practice requires companies to take action in advance by creating a hotline and training its employees in ethical behavior.