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Results released today (11 November) by the Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA) have offered Australian employers a blueprint to prevent and respond to sexual harassment in the workplace.
WGEA has released results that provide an initial look into the strategies employers have been putting forward since the introduction of the positive duty to provide a safe workplace for all employees came to fruition.
According to WGEA, more than 7,000 medium and large employers, covering more than 5 million Australian employees, reported new information about prevention and response to sexual harassment in 2024.
In the past, WGEA’s Respect at Work report claimed that for employers, a policy-based approach should be considered the bare minimum. Now, WGEA’s new results have shown that many employers have gone above that by implementing pathways to respond to work-related sexual harassment or sex discrimination. However, this is no time for employers to rest on their laurels, as WGEA claimed.
On this note, an area of focus for employers going forward is ensuring company leaders understand and promote expectations of a safe, respectful, and inclusive workplace.
While nearly 99 per cent of employers have a formal policy on work-related sexual harassment and discrimination, WGEA’s new data shows more than one in four employers (28 per cent) are not monitoring how prevalent it is, which is the kind of bare minimum work that WGEA warned against in their initial report.
WGEA chief executive Mary Wooldridge reiterated that employers’ new positive duty (introduced at the end of 2022) means taking effective action should begin, but not end, with a high-quality workplace policy.
“While we are seeing comprehensive policy coverage, this is only a critical first step. Long-term culture change within organisations also requires employees and company leaders to know the policy, understand what’s in it and the part they play in its implementation,” said Wooldridge
“One of the insights from the Respect@Work Report is that proactive engagement by leadership is critical for long-term change. WGEA’s new results show that most chief executives are highly engaged in reviewing, signing off on and then communicating these policies (85 per cent); however, just over half (55 per cent) of their boards are similarly involved.”
An issue that WGEA’s new results discovered was the lack of anonymous processes for when employees want to report sexual harassment, as anonymous disclosure processes reside at (68 per cent).
Despite this, Wooldridge highlighted the positive progress in conjunction with the WGEA reporting.
“Overall, we are seeing positive progress in relation to the prevention and responses to sexual harassment, but there’s more to be done,” said Wooldridge.
“WGEA’s new results expand employers’ understanding of where they are doing well and help to inform their plans for action to create safer, more inclusive and more respectful workplace environments for all employees.”
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Harassment is defined as persistent behaviour or acts that intimidate, threaten, or uncomfortably affect other employees at work. Because of anti-discrimination laws and the Fair Work Act of 2009, harassment in Australia is prohibited on the basis of protected characteristics.
Sexual harassment is characterised as persistent, frequent, and unwanted sexual approaches or behaviour of a sexual nature at work. Sexually harassing another person in a setting that involves education, employment, or the provision of goods or services is prohibited under the law.
Kace O'Neill
Kace O'Neill is a Graduate Journalist for HR Leader. Kace studied Media Communications and Maori studies at the University of Otago, he has a passion for sports and storytelling.
