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Whistle-blowers are no longer the disloyal company sneaks of old: they are, according to some, the saviours of the business world, and a whole industry has sprouted up to support their endeavours.

From an office overlooking the Thames from the south side of London Bridge, a team of four people working for corporate security specialist Control Risks (CR) is at this moment waiting for calls from employees of CR’s client companies who want to blow the whistle.

Staff members who know or suspect frauds or other forms of malpractice are being perpetrated within their companies can make contact at any time round the clock seven days a week.

Once CR’s staff have eliminated ‘time wasters’, serious-sounding concerns are passed on to employers, though their names and identities will be kept secret. If their employers decide to take action, CR can investigate the matter, says Toby Latta, who heads the investigative division.

CR, which started this service five years ago and now intends to launch an expansion drive, charges anything from a few thousand pounds to six figures a year, depending on the size of the company. It is one of several specialist firms offering similar services in the growing field of corporate whistle-blowing.

The idea is that whistle-blowers will feel more confident about voicing their concerns to an unconnected third party — and it might stop them from, in despair, taking their stories to the press. And it is the employers themselves who pay for it.

If present trends continue, some fear that whistle-blowing could sprout like compliance and become another parasitic growth on business. Whether there will be degree courses, and diplomas in whistle-blowing, as already with compliance, remains to be seen, but the momentum is building.

A brave new world
For most people trying to run businesses in these competitive times, a whistle-blower on the premises is precisely what they do not need. Airing problems publicly or in the press, which should be addressed internally, and giving comfort and possibly valuable information to the other side is never desirable. But that has not prevented a whole industry growing up to cater for whistle-blowing and how to respond to it.

Recent changes in the law affecting corporate governance and practices on both sides of the Atlantic, notably the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in the USA and Britain’s 1998 Public Interest Disclosure Act, have put pressure on companies to adopt a positive attitude to whistle-blowing — even if they do not go as far as German motor group BMW and offer bonuses to whistle-blowers with valid concerns. Whistle-blowing via internal hotlines to non-executive directors or other designated figures or through out-sourced independent routes is part of this brave new world.

However, the problem for company directors is that whistle-blowers come in all shapes and sizes and not all have the interests of their companies at heart. They range from genuinely concerned members of staff who feel intimidated about confronting an assertive boss to disappointed and resentful employees out to damage the business or put up to do so by rival companies.