Expert Opinion: How does the Worker Protection Act change how employers handle sexual harassment in the workplace?

The new Worker Protection Act has strengthened existing protections for workers against sexual harassment in the workplace. Stockport-based HR consultancy, Cornerstone Resources, explores the challenges employers face and what steps they should be doing now.

What does the Worker Protection Act cover?

The new law, which comes into force on 26th October 2024, imposes a greater duty on employers to take ‘reasonable steps’ to prevent sexual harassment of their workers by colleagues in the workplace. Employers that are found to have breached this newly strengthened duty may face tribunals with the power to increase a compensatory awards by up to 25%.

Employers may feel that they have policies in place to deal with a complaint. This may include whistle-blowing reporting measures and nominating specific people a complainant can speak to. They may even have a ‘zero tolerance’ approach which is mentioned in such policies and values. But is this enough?

What do employers need to do to protect themselves and their employees against sexual harassment in the workplace?

The Worker Protection Act has been the subject of significant debate during its development with two key changes along the way. When originally drafted, it was proposed to say employers must take ‘all reasonable steps.’ Following consultation with employer groups, this been scaled back to ‘reasonable steps’. Confusingly, the code of guidance still mentions all reasonable steps. There was also a possibility that the duty to protect workers from third party harassers was going to be added back into the legislation. This was dropped and is not included. however third parties are still mentioned in the Code of Practice.

Why is it important to take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment?

Obviously this is a good thing for all employers to do. However, it also makes financial sense. Discrimination claims have uncapped awards and tribunals can add a 10% compensation uplift if they don’t believe an employer has taken all reasonable preventative steps.

Recommendations for employers

An ACAS-led focus group worked on a number of ideas of what boards and organisations could do differently to support complainants and employees in workplaces. What is reasonable will depend on the size and resources of the employer, the nature of the working environment and associated risks including contact with third parties.

Their top three recommendations were:

1. If you say you are going to do something, then do it. It is better to try and do the right thing than do nothing.
2. Communication and employees feeling heard, and that they have a voice was another key recommendation. It suggested that there needed to be a much better understanding at board level of the challenges employees face and a commitment to listen and act either when direct complaints are made, or when information through other means such as surveys, pulse points, check-ins and polls suggest a problem may be bubbling away under the radar and an organisation must make the decision to step in anyway because their duty of care is alerted.
3. Businesses should consider how they can measure and collect insights/information on the scale of the issue and/or whether an issue is developing

All of these measures can support organisations to make informed decisions about the work they need to do to build great support mechanisms and processes.