A new report that aims to identify legal priorities related to workplace sexual harassment is calling for organisations to implement bold and enduring change to protect their staff.

“Australia is struggling to address the issue of workplace sexual harassment.”

Dr Leanne Lester, UWA Centre for Social Impact

Although an estimated one in three Australian workers has experienced sexual harassment at work, reporting remains alarmingly low at 18 per cent, prompting the Federal Government to provide more than $5 million in funding to Western Australia for legal assistance services for those affected.

The Centre for Social Impact at The University of Western Australia has partnered with Circle Green Community Legal to undertake the research. Circle Green is the lead agency delivering the Workplace Sexual Harassment and Discrimination Legal Services Project in WA.

The report Understanding workplace sexual harassment: Trends, barriers to legal assistance, consequences, and legal need, builds on existing literature on workplace sexual harassment (WSH), as well as interviews conducted with community legal centres and other stakeholder organisations, and people with lived experience of workplace sexual harassment, to identify and understand its prevalence, nature, and occurrence in WA.

Research lead author Dr Leanne Lester from the Centre for Social Impact at UWA said the report conveyed the need for a collective responsibility to protect people against the harm of sexual harassment in the workplace and identify the ways in which different stakeholders could contribute to a culture of workplace safety and respect.  

“Australia is struggling to address the issue of workplace sexual harassment,” Dr Lester said. “Reporting and legal structures rely on incidences of harassment to have already happened – and it also requires the person harmed to take responsibility for making a complaint.

“This, understandably, results in more distress. Proactive measures deal with the broader workplace structures that create harmful cultures where WSH is permitted.

“The solution is not bigger or ‘better’ reporting systems; these require people targeted by WSH to retell and relive, creating a great burden.

“Instead of continuing to place these unreasonable demands on people who have experienced WSH, we need organisations to implement bold, enduring change to protect staff – an environment of genuine respect, no matter their gender, ethnicity, sexuality.”  

Circle Green Project Manager Heidi Guldbaek said the report identified 10 recommendations for workplaces and employees and a further 10 suggestions for organisations providing legal assistance.  

“The report recommendations are centred around prevention and positive organisational cultural change, promoting a workplace structure based on acceptance and equality and reducing workforce and legal assistance barriers for those experiencing workplace sexual harassment,” Ms Guldbaek said.