The new Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) Act 2023 will come into force on 26 October 2024. The Act introduces a new positive legal obligation on employers to take reasonable steps to protect their workers from sexual harassment.
This means that employers will have a positive legal duty to prevent sexual harassment of their workers. They must take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment of workers in the course of their employment(the ‘preventative duty’ - section 40(A)(1)).
If an employer breaches the preventative duty, the Equality and Human Rights Commission will have the power to take enforcement action against the employer. Employment tribunals will also have the power to increase compensation for sexual harassment claims by up to 25%.
What is sexual harassment?
Sexual harassment is unwanted conduct of a sexual nature which has the purpose or effect of violating a worker’s dignity or creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment for that worker.
Sexual harassment of a worker can be committed by:
There are many different types of third parties that could sexually harass a worker (such as customers, clients, service users, patients, friends and family of colleagues, delegates at a conference and members of the public).
What are ‘reasonable steps’?
What is reasonable will vary from employer to employer and will depend on factors such as (but not limited to) the employer’s size, the sector it operates in, the working environment and its resources. It is an objective test and will depend on the facts/circumstances of the situation.
There are no particular criteria or minimum standards an employer must meet. Different employers may try to prevent sexual harassment in different ways, but no employer is exempt from the sexual harassment preventative duty.
Our employment law team can advise on steps employers can take to mitigate the risk of such claims. Please contact Joseph Oates jmo@cooperburnett.com or Natasha Smith nes@cooperburnett.com (tel 01892 515022).
This blog is not intended as legal advice that can be relied upon and CooperBurnett LLP does not accept any responsibility for the accuracy of its contents.
