Estimated reading time: 8 minutes

Updated August 2026

Background to the duty to prevent sexual harassment at work

Sexual Harassment is defined in the Equality Act 2010 as ‘Unwanted conduct related to sex, or of a sexual nature, which has the purpose of violating someone’s dignity or creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating, or offensive environment for them.

Sexual harassment in the workplace has long been unlawful under the Equality Act 2010. Employers may be held vicariously liable for acts of sexual harassment committed by their employees in the course of employment, unless employers can show they took all reasonable steps to prevent such conduct, under what is known as the “all reasonable steps” defence.

Both the employer and the individual accused of the harassing behaviour can be sued. You will see cases taken against both the employer and the individual.

On 26 October 2024, against the backdrop of the #MeToo movement and growing concern about workplace sexual harassment, the Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) Act 2023 (the Worker Protection Act) came into force. It strengthened the Equality Act by introducing a separate, positive legal duty on employers to take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment at work.

The duty requires employers to take a proactive approach, assessing the risk of sexual harassment, identifying the action needed to prevent it and regularly reviewing their processes.

Failing to comply with this preventative duty has financial consequences. Where an employee succeeds in a sexual harassment claim, an employment tribunal can increase any compensation award by up to 25% if the employer has failed to take reasonable steps to prevent the sexual harassment from occurring.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission has powers to enforce the preventative duty, even where no incident of sexual harassment has occurred

Changes under the Employment Rights Act 2025 (ERA 2025)

The Employment Rights Act 2025 takes effect through 2026 and 2027. It builds on the existing obligations to prevent sexual harassment introduced by the Worker Protection Act. The key changes under the ERA 2025 are:

• From 30th October 2026: the duty to take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment increases to a requirement to take all reasonable steps. What amounts to ‘all’ reasonable steps, we don’t yet know. The Government has said that it intends to consult on the detailed regulations before they are made, but at the time of writing, it hasn’t opened that consultation.
  
  The regulations are expected in 2027. Until then, employers should focus on complying fully with the current duty and the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s 8 step guide: preventing sexual harassment at work, set out below, while preparing as far as is practical for the changes coming in October 2026.
  
  
• From 30th October 2026: employer liability will also expand to include third-party harassment, meaning acts of harassment committed by customers, clients or members of the public. Employers may therefore be held liable for the actions of individuals who are not employed by the organisation and over whom the employer has very limited or no control. Importantly, employer liability for third-party harassment of their staff will extend beyond sexual harassment to cover all forms of discriminatory harassment.
  
  The introduction of third-party harassment liability affects all employers, but is particularly relevant to those operating in retail, hospitality and healthcare, where staff deal directly with the public, or in other roles involving greater interaction with contractors, suppliers and customers. For public-facing organisations, it represents a major shift and creates very real practical and operational challenges that generic policies alone can’t address.
  
  Many employers are already taking practical preventative steps, including assessing where third-party harassment risks are most likely to arise, addressing harassment in relevant supplier and customer contracts, encouraging staff to report incidents, investigating reports robustly and taking appropriate action. These measures will help lay the foundations for the changes coming in October.
  
• From 6 April 2026, disclosures relating to sexual harassment may qualify as protected disclosures under the whistleblowing legislation, provided the statutory requirements are met. For employers, this means that complaints of sexual harassment may give rise to both harassment and whistleblowing claims if not handled carefully. (It’s worth noting that complaints of sexual harassment may have qualified as protected disclosures under existing law, and it appears the Government’s aim by including this new provision is to encourage the reporting of sexual harassment by reinforcing protection for those who raise concerns).
  
  
• 2027 (date to be confirmed): Restrictions on confidentiality clauses (also known as gagging clauses). Most commonly found in settlement agreements, the Government intends to restrict the use of confidentiality clauses that seek to prevent workers from making allegations or disclosures about workplace harassment or discrimination. The detailed regulations are awaited.
  
  

The current duty to prevent sexual harassment: what employers should be doing now

Set out below are the key steps employers should be taking to comply with the current duty to prevent sexual harassment, to protect staff and put the business in the strongest position to defend claims. The steps are drawn from the EHRC’s Employer 8-step guide to preventing sexual harassment at work, with links through to the relevant sections of the guidance. (At the time of writing, the EHRC is updating its suite of guidance and resources. Bookmark this page; we will update it as further guidance becomes available).

• Carry out regular sexual harassment risk assessments. Risk assessments form a critical part of complying with the preventative duty. Employers should identify where sexual harassment is most likely to occur in their organisation, who may be at particular risk, and what practical measures can be taken to reduce that risk. Risk assessments should be reviewed regularly and whenever there are significant changes to the workplace or workforce or how work is carried out.
  
  
• Develop an effective anti-harassment policy and procedures, explaining what sexual harassment is, what inappropriate conduct looks like and how to report it.
  
  Anti-harassment provisions should also be included in relevant hybrid / home-working, online and social media policies, and should also cover conduct in these environments.  Sexual harassment can all too easily occur online, for example through WhatsApp groups, social media, email or video calls.
  
  Whistleblowing policies should also be reviewed to ensure they cover disclosures relating to sexual harassment. Employers should be alert to the potential for sexual harassment complaints to give rise to whistleblowing claims, where the complaint amounts to a qualifying protected disclosure.
  

Risk assessments, policies and procedures aren’t enough. You also need to:

• Train your staff regularly so that they recognise and know how to respond to sexual harassment, emphasising that such behaviour is not tolerated. Training helps employees to be more aware of their own behaviour and better equipped to detect incidents, it can also help to create an environment where disclosure can happen more easily.
  
  
• Make it easy to report incidents of sexual harassment anonymously. Employees should know how and to whom they can raise concerns, with clear and accessible reporting routes that protect their anonymity. Encourage reporting and make clear that concerns will be taken seriously and handled appropriately.
  
  
• Train line managers to know what appropriate conduct is and how to deal with inappropriate conduct.
  
  
• Create a culture of respect where all employees feel valued, safe from harassment and are sensitive to cultural differences. Inappropriate office culture and banter will need to change. Engage employees through regular 1-1s, staff surveys, exit interviews (which can be particularly helpful) and an open-door approach.
  
  
• Investigate complaints thoroughly. You must get to the bottom of what has happened and consider what needs to change to prevent a reoccurrence in the future.
  
  
• Review policies and procedures regularly to ensure that they are effective, up to date and comply with current legislation.
  
  
• Monitor and evaluate the actions you take. Regularly evaluate the effectiveness of the steps you put in place. 
  
  
• Set the tone from the top: involving the leadership and upper management in training and in embedding a culture of zero tolerance of sexual harassment which will influence employee behaviour and help staff to feel more comfortable about reporting issues.
  

Duty to prevent sexual harassment at work: how employers can protect against claims infographic

Download our infographic, showing the actions for preventing workplace sexual harassment based on the EHRC’s 8-step guidance on preventing sexual harassment at work.

EHRC guidance and practical resources for employers.

Alongside the 8-step guide for employers referred to above, the EHRC published further guidance and practical resources for employers. At the time of writing these are being updated to reflect the 2026 changes.

1. Technical guidance on sexual harassment and harassment at work, this is the EHRC’s more detailed guidance on sexual harassment, harassment and victimisation in employment under the Equality Act 2010.

2. Practical templates to help employers comply with the preventative duty, these were published to support the new preventative duty and include a checklist, action plan and monitoring log. The templates are designed to complement existing HR policies and help employers take practical action to protect their organisation and workers. The checklist was developed for the hospitality sector but can be adapted for other industries. It includes consideration of the risks of sexual harassment by third parties. With the expanded liability for third party harassment coming in October, we expect this aspect of the guidance to be fully updated. We wait to see.

The EHRC also has powers to enforce the preventative duty. Importantly, EHRC enforcement does not depend on an incident of sexual harassment having taken place. This means the EHRC can investigate an employer where it suspects the preventative duty has not been complied with and examine the preventative measures the organisation has in place.

Employers therefore face a more interventionist enforcement landscape, with closer regulatory oversight and an increased need to be able to demonstrate compliance. You should be able to evidence the preventative steps you are taking, through risk assessments, policies, training records and regular monitoring and review.

How can we help.

There is a lot for employers to digest and put in place here, and these changes form only a small part of the wider employment law reforms coming into force in October 2026 and under the Employment Rights Act 2025 in October 2026 and January 2027.

The Legal Partners regularly run practical well-received training sessions in this area. If you would like to discuss how we can support you and your teams with training to prevent sexual harassment and promote respect in the workplace, review and “stress test” your current practices ahead of the October 2026 changes, or provide advice on preventing and protecting against claims under the strengthened regime, please get in touch.