Bus driver’s statements to the press about defective assault alarms were not protected by the Whistleblower Act

In a ruling of May 7, 2026, the Board of Dismissals considered whether the termination of a bus driver was contrary to the Whistleblower Act and Section 4(3) of the Main Agreement on unfair dismissal. The Board found that the bus driver’s statements to the press that the company’s assault alarms were not working were not protected by the Whistleblower Act, and that the termination was justified.

The case concerned a bus driver who had been employed by a bus company since January 2024. For some time, the driver had criticized safety conditions on the buses, including the functionality of the assault alarms. Following an incident in June 2025, in which the driver activated the bus’s assault alarm during a fight between passengers without any subsequent response from the company’s operations monitoring center, he contacted the press and appeared in a news segment in which he discussed the conditions. Shortly thereafter, his employment was terminated by the company.

The Board of Dismissals: The conditions for whistleblower protection were not met 

The Board of Dismissals found that the driver’s disclosure of the information to the press did not meet the conditions for protection under Section 5(2) of the Whistleblower Act.

In this connection, the Board emphasized, among other things, that the driver had not used the company’s internal whistleblower scheme or an external whistleblower scheme before disclosing the information to the press. The Board also found that the driver did not have reasonable grounds to believe that the matters he spoke about in the press constituted such an imminent or manifest danger to the public interest that he could lawfully disclose information about them and at the same time obtain protection under the Whistleblower Act.

In this regard, the Board emphasized that, based on the evidence presented, the driver should not have used the assault alarm during the incident in June 2025, as he himself was not in danger. Nor did the Board find any basis for assuming that the subsequent stabbing, after the passengers had left the bus, could have been avoided if the alarm call had been answered.

Weight was also given to the fact that, after the incident, the company had implemented new procedures involving ongoing checks of the assault alarms.

On that basis, the Board found that the driver’s disclosure of the information was not protected by the Whistleblower Act, and the termination was therefore not contrary to the Act.

The Board of Dismissals also found that the termination was not unreasonable under Section 4(3) of the Main Agreement. In its assessment, the Board emphasized, among other things, the driver’s previous warnings, secret recordings of conversations with colleagues, and repeated activations of assault alarms in situations where there were no genuine emergencies. The employer was therefore acquitted.

Littler notes 

Employers with 50 or more employees are required to establish an internal whistleblower scheme through which employees can report information about breaches of EU law, serious violations of the law, and other serious matters covered by the protection of the Whistleblower Act. Littler | Denmark assists employers with establishing and operating whistleblower schemes. Contact us to learn more about this.

The ruling underscores that the protection afforded by the Whistleblower Act only applies if the matter being reported, in the first instance, falls within the scope of protection of the Act.

In addition, it is generally a condition for a whistleblower to be covered by the protection that the whistleblower first uses the available internal and external whistleblower schemes.

Only in special circumstances will a whistleblower be protected when publicly disclosing the matter being reported under Section 5(2) of the Whistleblower Act.

The ruling emphasizes that the disclosure of information is only covered by the protection if one of the following applies:

A report to an internal or external whistleblower scheme has not been effective.

The employee has reasonable grounds to believe that the violation may constitute an imminent or manifest danger to the public interest.

There are reasonable grounds to believe that, in the event of reporting to an external whistleblower scheme, there is a risk of retaliation, or that, due to the specific circumstances of the case, there is little prospect that the violation will be effectively addressed.

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Disclaimer: The above is not, and cannot replace, legal advice.

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Reference: the Board of Dismissals’ ruling of May 7, 2026 – case 20250767