A record number of public officials sought whistleblower protection for reporting corrupt conduct in Queensland last financial year, but concerns remain about the extent to which state’s corruption watchdog is able to investigate and prosecute many of those cases.

The Queensland ombudsman has responsibility for oversight of public interest disclosures – a formal process designed to protect whistleblowers. In 2017-18, public officials made 591 disclosures about corrupt conduct, representing about three-quarters of the total claims made by whistleblowers.

For the same period, the ombudsman reported that 70% of all whistleblower disclosures were substantiated or partially substantiated.

The state’s Crime and Corruption Commission is the investigative body for allegations of corruption within the public service and in 2017-18 finalised 56 investigations. Over that period it received more than 3,000 complaints containing 8,862 allegations of corruption.

Over a three-month period from March to May this year, the CCC received 368 complaints about police. It started two investigations.

In most cases involving police, complaints were referred back to the police ethical standards command to investigate.

Civil liberties advocates say the statistics point to a growing problem with corruption and a lack of willingness to address it. Renee Eaves, the spokesperson for the Queensland Police Accountability Taskforce, said the high threshold for the CCC to investigate “didn’t pass the pub test”.

The group is calling for an independent inquiry into how complaints about police are investigated and managed.

“When you see those sorts of statistics, it’s clear that corrupt conduct is occurring in Queensland that is not being properly investigated,” she said.

Eaves also raised concern about protections afforded to whistleblowers. She cited specific cases where former police officers had been compensated for reprisals, but the perpetrators had not been investigated, punished or charged.

“No one has ever been charged with a reprisal against a whistleblower in Queensland,” Eaves said. “We know they are happening. What does that say about the effectiveness of the public interest disclosure act?”

Terry O’Gorman, the civil liberties campaigner who played a crucial role in the Fitzgerald inquiry in Queensland more than 30 years ago, has previously said the CCC had become too “toothless” to protect police whistleblowers.

Concerns have previously been raised the CCC focuses too heavily on its role investigating serious and organised crime, in contrast with its remit to tackle public sector corruption.

Michael Cope, the president of the Queensland Civil Liberties Council, told Guardian Australia last month the problem stemmed from the decision in 2001 to merge the state’s criminal justice commission with the Queensland crime commission.



Cope said the crime and misconduct commission, which later became the CCC, effectively functions as a “super police force” that handles major criminal cases alongside the oversight of police and the public sector. He argued those roles should be separated.



“We’re back to the bad old days pre-Fitzgerald where people are contacting [the civil liberties council] saying things like ‘I made a complaint about the police and a sergeant from the same police station turned up to investigate the complaint’,” he said.

The Crime and Corruption Commission Act in Queensland sets out what is known as the devolution principle: that “action to prevent and deal with corruption in an agency should generally happen in the agency”.

“The CCC focuses its resources on the most serious and systemic corruption matters,” a spokesperson for the commission said. “In the 2017-18 financial year, the CCC focused its resources on pursuing corruption involving elected officials, excessive use of force and misuse of confidential information. Thirty-eight people were charged with 176 criminal offences resulting from corruption-related investigations.

“When the CCC refers a matter to another agency to investigate, the CCC can request regular reports and direct them to finalise the matter within a specified period of time.

“If the CCC finds that the standard of an investigation or the outcome is not in its view satisfactory, then it can assume responsibility for dealing with the complaint.”