As prohibited personnel practices continue a downward trend begun in 1992, the Merit Systems Protection Board has said it would begin devoting special attention to whistleblower retaliation and will explore federal employee opinions concerning the whistleblowing process and barriers to reporting wrongdoing beginning with its next Merit Principles Survey.
MSPB said the government has made substantial progress in achieving a workplace largely free of discrimination and that employees in general are beginning to perceive it as relatively discrimination-free.
Prohibited practices overall are on the decline as well, MSPB said, such as coercing political activity, obstructing persons from competing for employment, and discriminating on the basis of non job-related personal conduct.
It also said the percentage of employees who believe that they have been retaliated against for exercising their right to file an appeal, report an unlawful behavior, or disclose a safety danger has fallen in recent years.
While noting that 70 percent of employees still express concern that some supervisors base personnel decisions on favoritism rather than merit, MSPB said that going forward its newly constituted board would attempt to learn more about prohibited practices and whistleblowing in particular.