New Sexual Harassment Legislation Demands Proactive Steps From Businesses

New Sexual Harassment Legislation Demands Proactive Steps From Businesses

A new piece of legislation has mandated that all employers must take reasonable steps to protect their workforce from the threat of sexual harassment.

From 26th October, the Worker Protection Act 2023 (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) will force Businesses, Law Firms and Chambers into making anticipatory changes to their policies and guidelines as a means of preventing sexual harassment incidents.  

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) said it would have the power to take enforcement action against employers if they were not seen to be “proactive” on the issue. Talking to Legal Futures, they explained:

“Employers should not wait until an incident of sexual harassment has taken place before they take any action. The duty requires that employers should anticipate scenarios when its workers may be subject to sexual harassment in the course of employment and take action to prevent such harassment taking place…however, if an employer fails to take reasonable steps to comply with the preventative duty, there are consequences."

 What are the legal changes? 

The legal change has been heavily debated during its legislative journey, and has undergone two significant changes.

Senior Policy Advisor at the CIPD, Rachel Suff, said that now that the law is coming into force, it presents “an important opportunity to build awareness and encourage compliance to prevent sexual harassment within the workplace.”

She believes that employers need to be proactive and meticulous in how they plan to prevent sexual harassment in the workplace. She continued, “This is not a ‘tick-box’ exercise and employers will need to show evidence of the reasonable steps taken. To do so, they need to focus attention on a number of priority areas.”


What are the consequences? 

Employers which fail to comply with the new duty face both financial and reputational risks. 

If an employee succeeds with an employment tribunal claim for sexual harassment - and the employer is found to have breached its duty to take reasonable steps to avoid the sexual harassment - the tribunal will be able to uplift the monetary value by up to 25%. 

As there is no limit to the amount of compensation that can be awarded for discriminatory harassment, making the potential financial impact significant.

Overall, it is essential for employers to take proactive steps to prevent sexual harassment in the workplace to avoid both financial and reputational risks associated with non-compliance.

What areas do organisations need to focus on? 

The CIPD have released those areas as:

  • Organisational and cultural change: Senior leaders have a defining influence on the working culture and set the tone for expectations around behaviour and workplace civility. They need to embed and live the values and behaviour that underpin dignity, respect and inclusion.
  • Policies and procedures: A formal policy won’t change culture on its own but it’s still important to have written policies and guidance. These should define sexual harassment, give examples of what it is and outline everyone’s responsibilities for preventing and tackling it. 
  • Training and development: There should be annual training sessions provided all staff so that they understand what sexual harassment is and their role in preventing and addressing it.
  • Reporting channels and investigating: There need to be well-promoted reporting channels for complaints and the organisation needs to respond to these promptly, fairly and thoroughly. Any evidence of discriminatory behaviour or harassment among staff needs to be investigated and acted on swiftly and a clear message sent out that such behaviour will not be tolerated.
  • People management capability: Line managers play an important role in identifying, challenging and dealing with unfair treatment including sexual harassment. They need to have the training, education and guidance to give them the confidence to tackle sexual harassment.
  • Monitoring and review: Monitoring the gender diversity of the workforce at every level, including for recruitment and promotion, will help to highlight if there is any potential discrimination or harassment on grounds of gender. Staff attitude surveys will enable the organisation to collect feedback in areas like gender equality and bullying and harassment.

Prevention of Sexual Harassment at Work Training

UK employers now have a legal obligation to safeguard employees from harassment and sexual harassment and training aims to equip both employers and employees with the knowledge and tools to prevent, recognise, and address these issues effectively.

To help organisations implement proactive steps, we've developed two training modules: 

For further details regarding our new training, please visit our webpage or feel free to reach out to us via email at hello@getbriefed.com.

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