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Our Work

Campaigns

Our advocacy campaigns are based on international standards of research and draw attention to risks and identified cases of corruption in all its forms, while highlighting the costs of the abuse of power and the opportunities and benefits that arise when power is used in everyone’s interest. 

Since 2005 we have been actively campaigning for higher standards in public and corporate life. Through our website, newsletter, press releases, media interviews, opinion pieces, public meetings, lectures, reports and public submissions we have attempted to place the prevention of corruption on the national agenda. Some of our past advocacy campaigns include:

  • TI Ireland successfully campaigned for and assisted the Government in drafting the Protected Disclosures Act 2014. The Act came into effect in July 2014, and the protections under the Act are claimed to be among the strongest in the world. Since then, TI Ireland have continued to advocate for further reform through our submissions and advocacy, including through the transposition of the EU Whistleblowing Directive by the Protected Disclosures Amendment Act 2022.  
  • TI Ireland supported whistleblowers Garda Sergeant Maurice McCabe and former Garda John Wilson in their efforts to expose systematic petty corruption involving senior Garda who were falsifying or cancelling road-traffic offence records.
  • In 2014, we helped bring about reforms of the Freedom of Information Act and successfully lobbied for the removal of up-front fees for FOI requests.
  • TI Ireland coordinated civil society input into the Open Government Partnership in 2014, and we continue to raise awareness of the importance of stopping corruption in Ireland through mainstream and social media.
  • TI Ireland participated in an EU Commission funded project, titled Lifting the Lid on Lobbying between 2014 and 2016. Building on this work, we successfully lobbied the government to introduce the Regulation of Lobbying Act 2015.

Helpline

Transparency International Ireland has been operating the Speak Up helpline since May 2011. In 2015, we published the first Speak Up report, which was based on data compiled from the first four years of operating the helpline. This report helped us analyse the impact of the Protected Disclosures Act in its first year and identify corruption risks. We published the second Speak Up Report in 2017. This report featured the results of the first Integrity at Work survey, which for the first time measured the attitudes and experiences of Irish employees and employers to whistleblowing. The third Speak Up Report was published in 2020, which is available here. Our most recent 2025 Speak Up Report includes the results of the second Integrity at Work survey, and analysis of how attitudes and experiences of Irish employees and employers to whistleblowing have changed since 2017.

This short video provides an overview of the support we have provided through Speak Up.

​Integrity at Work

TI Ireland launched our Integrity at Work (IAW) programme in 2016. IAW is a multi-stakeholder not-for-profit initiative for employers, employees, trade unions, and regulators. It aims to create cultural change by promoting supportive environments for whistleblowers through training, best practice exchange, online resources and specialist advice and guidance.

Research

Transparency International Ireland’s reports, studies, and other publications are all available on our resources page. To date, TI Ireland’s work has focused on the following areas:

  • From early 2005 on, we began working on identifying governance related problems which led to the publication of TI Ireland’s National Integrity Systems (NIS) study in March 2009. We published an Addendum to the NIS study in 2012.
  • In 2010 TI Ireland published the Alternative to Silence report. This study was the result of research into the law protecting whistleblowers in Ireland. We built on this work by launching the ‘Speak Up’ helpline in 2011. In early 2015, we published our first Speak Up Report, which was based on data compiled from operating the helpline.
  • TI Ireland published our Countdown to Impunity study on the effect statutes of limitations have on the prosecution of corruption in the EU in 2011. 
  • Between 2014 and 2016, we carried out research on lobbying and its regulation as part of an EU Commission funded project titled Lifting the Lid on Lobbying. Our study Influence and Integrity was the first published under this project. We then led a research stream on ethical lobbying on behalf of Transparency International and published the Responsible Lobbying in Europe report and Responsible Lobbying Guide in 2015.
  • Since 2018, TI Ireland has published five National Integrity Indexes on Local Authorities, Private Sector Companies, Semi-states and Universities, and Public Bodies. The indices assess these institutions systems and practices to promote integrity and rank them accordingly.
  • TI Ireland published our Safe Haven report report in 2021, which highlighted the risk that Irish-based financial services and companies are being used to launder the proceeds of international corruption.
  • TI Ireland has worked towards the objective of ending the use of Ireland as a safe haven for the world’s dirty money. Our 2024 report ‘Weak Links’ draws attention to vulnerabilities within Ireland’s legal framework that may be exploited by bad actors for money laundering, corruption and other illicit activities..

For more information on the achievements of the worldwide Transparency International movement, please click here