I commend the Hereford Times article entitled “Critics blame those at top” in the newspaper (July 13).

The article is about the Mind the Gaps report by former chair and vice-chair of Herefordshire Council’s children and young people scrutiny committee.

Their report criticised inter alia the children’s commissioner’s report for not addressing “the ‘toxic’ organisational culture...which has undermined multiple attempts at improvement over the years”.

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Especially given the council’s “toxic” culture and the longstanding “inadequate” children’s services, I was disappointed that the audit and governance committee on June 23 approved a revised whistleblowing policy.

The previous whistleblowing policy said: “If you feel that the matter is so serious that you cannot discuss it with any of the above, please contact the chief executive at Herefordshire Council, internal audit or the monitoring officer at Buckinghamshire Council”.

What are your thoughts?

You can send a letter to the editor to have your say by clicking here.

Letters should not exceed 250 words and local issues take precedence.

However, the new whistleblowing policy does not give potential whistleblowers the option to contact the monitoring officer of another council, which I consider would discourage potential whistleblowers to raise concerns, especially serious ones.

Whistleblowers need tremendous moral courage as they are often victimised etc.

Does Herefordshire Council wish to discourage or encourage whistleblowers?

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