Key Points
- New sexual harassment laws have been enacted in Australian workplaces.
- They include a lowered threshold for defining sex-based harassment.
- Subjecting another person to a workplace environment that is hostile on the ground of sex has been banned.
New laws that force employers to take responsibility for preventing sexual harassment have come into force in Australian workplaces.
They now give the Human Rights Commission (HRC) the power to investigate if companies and employers are taking proactive steps to make workplaces safer.
As organisations shift their focus from zero tolerance to zero harm, the threshold for defining sex-based harassment has been lowered, by requiring the conduct to be 'demeaning' rather than 'seriously demeaning'.
The new measures passed into law last year as the Respect at Work Act and come from handed down by former sex discrimination commissioner Kate Jenkins.
The Respect at Work Act has changed the priority and focus of the Sex Discrimination Act to the systemic prevention of sexual harassment, sex-based harassment and discrimination, hostile work environments and victimisation.
It also bans subjecting another person to a workplace environment that is hostile because of their sex.
How do the sexual harassment laws work
In a statement on Tuesday, Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus said the changes would seek to prevent sexual harassment from happening in the workplace, rather than have workplaces react to it taking place.
"This shifts the responsibility away from individual employees enforcing their right to a safe and inclusive workplace, to employers to ensure the workplace is safe and inclusive for all employees," he said.
"All workplaces should be safe, inclusive and free from harassment, discrimination and other unlawful behaviours."
Reasonable and proportionate measures required to discharge an employer’s duty will vary and depend on the size and nature of the company, its resources and the practicability and costs associated with the steps.
The HRC will have regulatory powers to investigate companies that may not be meeting obligations to act to prevent sexual harassment.
The commission will also be able to issue compliance notices or make a court application to force compliance for businesses that have failed to meet the criteria.
It comes as the latest national survey on sexual harassment found one-third of people who had been employed in the past five years had experienced sexual harassment at work.
Dreyfus said the commission would be given $5.8 million over four years to carry out the enforcement work.
"The new role of the Australian Human Rights Commission will be a positive step towards ensuring safe, inclusive and respectful workplaces for all employees," he said.
Why were Australia's new sexual harassment laws brought in?
Fewer than one in five people who had experienced workplace sexual harassment had made a complaint about it, HRC research found.
Sex discrimination commissioner Anna Cody says the rate of people reporting sexual harassment in work is 'woefully low'. Source: AAP / Dam Himbrechts
"I'm really heartened to see this change, it really is a major change to our system and will make it a lot easier.
"It will also create a fairer society and a more equal society for all women."
The changes were resisted by the former Coalition government, which questioned whether the legislation would add further complexity to workplace laws.
The HRC has suggested workplaces reward employees' respectful behaviour incentives such as pay increases and gift vouchers while punishing poor behaviour by blocking pay rises and bonuses, as well as suspending employees.
