ITALY Trends and Developments Contributed by: Giuseppe Fornari, Enrico Di Fiorino, Emanuele Angiuli and Lorena Morrone, Fornari e Associati
amounts of secretarial fees to be paid for practices and outputs on beneficial owner - ship. In 2023, certain private associations filed an appeal with the Regional Administrative Tribunal or TAR of Lazio, seeking the annulment of these Decrees. Although the court initially accepted the request and suspended the deadline for sub - mitting information for the Register, in April 2024 the TAR of Lazio rejected six appeals from some other associations, thereby lifting the suspen - sion of the deadline. On 15 October 2024, the Council of State sus - pended the operation of the Register with Order No 8248/2024. The Council of State found that the provisions of the Implementing Decree could potentially violate Articles 7 and 8 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, which protect the right to privacy and person - al data. For this reason, the Council of State referred six preliminary questions to the Court of Justice of the European Union, concerning the interpretation and the validity of EU Directive No 2015/849. Whistle-Blowing On 10 March 2023, the Italian government issued Legislative Decree No 24/2023( “the Decree” ), which comprehensively regulates “the protec- tion of persons who report breaches of Union law” and “breaches of national legislation” . The new legislation raised, and still raises, many interpretation and application issues, to which attempts have been made to find adequate solu - tions from several sides. Moreover, companies are called upon to make a complex adjustment to the new whistle-blowing legislation, in order to avoid the imposition of administrative fines, the extent of which (unlike many other issues
regulated by the Decree) has been very clear from the outset. In this scenario, of particular importance and support for companies are the Guidelines adopted by the Italian National Anti-Corruption Authority ( Autorità Nazionale AntiCorruzione or ANAC) with Resolution No 311/2023 of 12 July 2023 and the Operational Guide for Private Enti - ties issued by Confindustria in October 2023. These sources of soft law have been designed to provide guidance to companies which are sub - ject to whistle-blowing regulations. Moreover, on 7 November 2024, ANAC adopt - ed further Guidelines on whistle-blowing and launched a consultation on them which ended in December 2024. The Guidelines aimed to pro - vide further clarifications on the implementation and management of internal reporting channels. In addition to public sector bodies, the whistle- blowing legislation is addressed to: • entities that have employed an average of at least 50 employees in the past year (with fixed-term or open-ended contracts); • entities operating in specific sectors (banking, credit, investment, insurance and reinsurance, professional pensions or individual pension products, securities, investment funds, pay - ment services), even with an average number of fewer than 50 employees in the past year; and • entities that have adopted organisational and management models pursuant to Legislative Decree No 231/2001( “231 Models” ), even with an average of fewer than 50 employees in the past year.
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