Sexual harassment endemic in UK workplaces, survey finds

The union, which has almost 300,000 women members, polled women working across all 19 sectors Unite represents on whether they had experienced sexual harassment while at work, travelling to work or from a colleague including in or out of work hours.

Disturbingly the survey revealed that a quarter (25 per cent) had been sexually assaulted, while eight per cent had been a victim of sexual coercion - when a person pressures, tricks, threatens, or manipulates someone into engaging in sexual activity without genuine consent - at work.

The survey, part of Unite's Zero Tolerance to Sexual Harassment campaign, found 56 per cent had been the recipient of sexually offensive jokes, 55 per cent had experienced unwanted flirting, gesturing or sexual remarks, over four in 10 (43 per cent) had been inappropriately touched and over a quarter (28 per cent) had been shared or shown pornographic images by a manager, colleague or third party.

Out of those who had been sexually harassed at work in most occasions it was not a one off instance, almost half (48 per cent) had it happen more than twice, while over a third (36 per cent) had experienced it more than once. However, three quarters (75 per cent) of respondents did not report these incidents, meaning many perpetrators are left free to offend again.

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: "Staff safety should be among the highest priorities for employers, but the results of our survey are damming and show women workers are being failed by bosses.

"Nobody should suffer sexual harassment in the workplace. Unite is committed to taking a zero-tolerance approach and we will put every employer turning a blind eye on notice.

"We will fight every step of the way to stamp out workplace harassment once and for all. Every worker deserves a safe working environment and should feel able to report harassment."

While the issue is endemic across all sectors, some were more badly affected than others. Areas which had higher levels of staff experiencing harassment include construction, civil air transport, passenger transport, food, drink and agricultural and road transport, warehousing and logistics, which all saw high percentages of incidents and many of these going unreported.

Many respondents to the survey said they didn't report harassment they had experienced or witnessed as they were worried they wouldn't be believed or it would put their job at risk. This was backed up by the experiences of many Unite members who had reported incidents - the union received several comments on how they had been disbelieved or accused of lying, while others said perpetrators had been allowed to remain at the workplace and in some cases had even been promoted. Other victims of harassment at work said they had been let go from their roles after reporting it to line managers.

Last October, The Worker Protection Act 2023 became law. This means employers must take measures to prevent sexual harassment from happening in the workplace and at work events such as conferences. However, Unite's research shows this is not being implemented fully and workers are being failed.

Unite's survey found just 26 per cent of respondents felt their employer had done enough to promote a sexual harassment zero-tolerance culture within the workplace, while 34 per cent did not believe there was a zero-tolerance approach to this behaviour at their place of work.

Unite has launched a campaign calling for greater protections to end the menace of workplace harassment. Measures Unite is campaigning for include:

• The introduction of a standalone sexual harassment policy
• Mandatory training on sexual harassment for all employees and a commitment to recognise union equality representatives with paid time off
• The deadline for being able to make a claim in an employment tribunal to be extended from three months after the incident occurred to six months as a minimum for lodging a claim
• The government to put in extra legal protections, for example third party harassment and sexual harassment should be treated by the Health and Safety Executive as a workplace injury.

Unite national women’s officer Alison Spencer-Scragg said: "The Worker Protection Act has not gone far enough in keeping women safe from sexual harassment at their workplace.

"Employers are not taking their obligations seriously despite the fact it is the law. This is creating a culture where sexual harassment is going unreported, while those who do take the issues forward are left feeling disbelieved, forced to work with abusers and even losing their roles.

"Unite is calling on the government to take our demands seriously to stamp out sexual harassment at work."