How Aged Care Boards Use Whistleblowing Data for Good Governance

The new Aged Care Act 2024 and Aged Care Rules 2025 mark a decisive shift in how Australia’s 3000+ aged care providers, boards and executives must approach whistleblowing.

No longer a back office or HR task, whistleblowing is now positioned as a core governance and quality assurance mechanism, one that provides real-time, unfiltered insights into risks that formal audits or scheduled inspections may miss.

Damaging issues within aged care - leadership failure, neglect, abuse or clinical mismanagement - often surface first through anonymous disclosures. Staff, residents or families typically raise serious concerns only when they feel safe to speak up.

Boards that treat whistleblowing as a strategic indicator gain earlier visibility into cultural and operational trends and risks well before they erupt into crises – building trust, improving culture, reducing risk and strengthening day-to-day care quality.

Regulatory Requirements: What Boards Need to Know

Now, under s165 of the Aged Care Act 2024, registered providers must implement and maintain a whistleblower system that goes beyond simply having a policy on file. The Aged Care Rules 2025 (effective 1 November) go even further, requiring providers to promote a safe, confidential and culturally safe system for disclosure, supported by compulsory training so all staff understand their rights, obligations and reporting channels.

These reforms were introduced in response to Royal Commission findings that weak reporting cultures blocked early detection of risk.

How Whistleblowing Metrics Strengthen Board Oversight, Trust & Culture

Boards should review whistleblowing data as they would any other core governance indicator, because the patterns revealed through four key metrics offer the clearest signal of organisational health - and the greatest opportunity to strengthen culture:

1. Volume: A spike in disclosures could signal emerging issues; unusually low numbers might reflect fear or distrust rather than a problem-free culture.
   
2. Themes: Recurring concerns about clinical care, resident dignity, staffing or misconduct expose deeper systemic risk that audits miss.
   
3. Resolutions: Long delays in investigations may indicate weak processes or poor accountability.
   
4. Culture: Survey results alongside whistleblowing metrics tell you if staff trust your protections enough to use them. 

Under the strengthened protections in the 2025 Rules - including confidential reporting pathways, anti-retaliation safeguards and mandated staff training - these metrics don’t just support oversight; they help build trust.

Boards reinforce this trust by acting visibly on recurring themes, addressing underlying issues and demonstrating clear “you said, we did” outcomes so staff, residents and families see that concerns lead to real change.

The Royal Commission’s final report made it clear that a strong speak-up culture is essential to delivering high-quality care. When staff trust that raising concerns will lead to action, organisations detect risk earlier, retain skilled workers and build stronger, trusting relationships with residents and families.

Veremark As a Strategic Partner

Technology is essential to effective whistleblowing. Adapting dynamically to your organisation, Veremark’s end-to-end encrypted solution helps aged care providers turn regulatory requirements into practical governance.

Our best-in-class practices and deep domain expertise helps you to build a speak-up culture and meet the new Aged Care Rules with confidence, through:

• Anonymised reporting through secure channels with military-grade encryption 
• Structured, high-quality reporting prompts
• Data dashboards for volume, themes and resolution metrics
• Custom culture-survey modules
• Integration into broader risk and quality systems

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