The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), in addition to its revised technical guidance on sexual harassment and 8-step guide for employers, has published templates to assist employers with compliance with the new positive duty to prevent sexual harassment in the workplace.
Please see our previous blog on this.
On review, these templates comprise a checklist, action plan and monitoring log. The EHRC has confirmed that these templates aim to work alongside existing HR policies and help employers to take proactively protect their organisation and workers.
The checklist was developed for the hospitality industry, but the EHRC suggests it can be amended to suit other sectors. Currently, it is based in terms of actions to be implemented before, during, and after a shift has ended. It includes specific consideration of third-party harassment risk. This is the risk posed to staff from people outside of their employer (customers, suppliers etc).
The action plan sets out proposals for including the checklist into the organisation’s wider policies and procedures. Monitoring logs are to be used to monitor how the checklist and action plan are being used for the purpose of ‘checks and balances.’ The EHRC also recommends a more detailed quarterly log so the effectiveness of the checklist can be assessed and any appropriate action taken where necessary.
Please see a link here for access to the three EHRC templates.
This blog was written by Elizabeth McGlone, Partner at didlaw.
