Preventing sexual harassment: Are you compliant with the new law?

Preventing sexual harassment | Man with head in hands

Eden Scott is a team of recruitment professionals. While the information provided here is accurate to the best of our knowledge, it is intended for general guidance only. To ensure compliance with current and upcoming legislation, employers can consult with an HR or employment law specialist.

The Worker Protection Act 2023 came into effect on 26th October 2024. The new law gives employers a higher duty of care to their employees by preventing sexual harassment (People Management).

Let’s explore the new regulations so you can make sure your company is compliant.

What is the new requirement for companies to prevent sexual harassment?

The law requires employers to take ‘reasonable steps’ to prevent sexual harassment from happening in a workplace setting.

This includes harassment from a leader, worker-on-worker harassment, and harassment from a third party like a client, customer or supplier. It also includes sexual harassment that happens offsite, for example on a training course, at a conference, at a meeting or at a work-related social event.

Companies need to anticipate the risk of sexual harassment in all work-related settings, and be proactive in reducing that risk (Equality and Human Rights Commission). They must also investigate reports of sexual harassment and take appropriate action.

What are the consequences of failing to prevent sexual harassment at work?

If an employee brings a successful claim of sexual harassment to an employment tribunal, the tribunal decides the appropriate compensation costs. If it’s found that the employer breached its duty to prevent sexual harassment, then an additional 25% could be added to the compensation amount (Burges Salmon).

Additionally, the EHRC can launch an investigation into employers that it believes may have breached their duty to prevent sexual harassment. If upheld, the commission can enforce an action plan or formal agreement to prevent similar illegal occurrences in the future (Employment Law Watch).

How can you take ‘reasonable steps’ to prevent sexual harassment at work?

1. Risk assessment
Guidance from the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) states employers should consider factors like:

Where are the power imbalances?
Is there a lack of diversity in your workforce?
Is there job insecurity for a particular group or role?
Are staff working alone or at night?
Do your staff have customer-facing duties?
Are customers or staff drinking alcohol?
Are staff expected to attend external events, conferences or training?
Do staff socialise outside of work?
Do staff engage in crude or disrespectful behaviour at work?

These questions should help to inform your risk assessment - consider other factors at your employees’ place of work that could increase the likelihood of sexual harassment.

2. Create an anti-harassment policy
Using findings from your risk assessment, create an anti-harassment policy that specifies:

What constitutes sexual harassment, providing specific examples
That sexual harassment at work is illegal
Your duties under the law
The consequences, including disciplinary action or dismissal

For more, visit the Equality and Human Rights Commission website.

3. Inform employees
Make sure all employees are aware of your anti-harassment policy and the consequences for breaching them. Ideally, this would be in a meeting setting rather than in an email or memo. You can ask employees to confirm that they have understood the new standards in writing, or confirm their attendance at a meeting.

4. Make it easy to report sexual harassment
Create an easy-to-use reporting channel for reporting concerns, and ensure employees can report anonymously should they wish to.

5. Investigate concerns and take disciplinary action
If the investigation finds that sexual harassment did take place, take swift and decisive disciplinary action, and make adjustments to your workplace policy to prevent similar incidents from occurring.

6. Provide training
Provide regular training to remind employees of your anti-harassment policy, your duty to prevent sexual harassment, and how they can report concerns.