Emerging Occupational Health Issues: Sexual Harassment in Hospitality

This report delves into the emerging occupational health issue of sexual harassment within the Australian hospitality industry. It begins by outlining the significance of this hazard, emphasizing the differences between safety and health risks, and the impact on employees' mental and physical we...Read More

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Introduction
For every organization, employees are an important asset and an organization is required
to take care of the same. During the performance of the job, an employee faces many issues that
can be related to various factors. Health and safety are one such factor. A worker may face many
safety and health hazards during the performance of his/her job. Both of these terms seem to be
interchangeable but this is not true and in actuality, there is a huge difference in both of them.
Workplace safety hazards are quick incidents such as fire or cut by a knife while working but
risk hazards have slow and long-term impact on the health of employees of the organization. The
main difference between workplace safety hazard and risk hazard is that the risk hazard affects
different employee in a different manner. In comparison to a safety hazard, risk hazards get less
attraction of organizations but the situation should not be like this. Employers are required to
understand that health hazards also affect mental as well as physical health of employees and are
even more dangerous than safety hazards. For the purpose of preparation of this report, the
sexual harassment in the hospitality industry of Australia is selected as a workplace risk hazard.
The report will present the legislative requirement to deal with this issue in addition to the
standard practices adopted by the subjective industry to deal with the selected issue.
Sexual Harassment in the Hospitality Industry
Sexual Harassment refers to an unwelcome and unwilling sexual behavior that is
humiliating and offensive for the victim. There is not a universally accepted definition and
inclusive factors for sexual harassment. According to the Australian Human Rights Commission,
Sexual harassment includes the following factors but not limited to:-
 Staring

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 Leering
 Making taunts of sexual nature
 Making a request for sex
 Showing pornography
 Cracking sexual jokes or making sexual comments
 Behavior that may be counted as an offense under criminal law, for instance, sexual
assault, physical assault, stalking, indecent exposure, or obscene communications
(Humanrights.gov.au, 2019).
Employees of many of the industry are facing this issue but in Australia, the rate of
sexual harassment is high in the hospitality industry in comparison to other industry. Sexual
harassment present in many forms in the hotel industry and there are many reasons behind the
same. First of all the shift timings of workers in this industry creates a problem for them. They
have to work in late night shifts, which enhance the chances of sexual harassment. Another
reason is that they have to deal with drunk clients more often that are not in their sense and
behave abusively. It is not like that worker only faces sexual harassment from the side of clients,
but managers and other colleagues also involve in the same. While discussing the data, this is
important to mention that out of total workers who have experienced the sexual harassment in
the hospitality industry, around 56.3% of workers have faced the issue from the side of a member
of the public whereas rest 22.7% of workers been targeted by their managers (Topping, 2019). It
has been noted that many of the employers failed to protect their staff from regular abuse. The
significance of this risk is necessary to understand here. Incidents of sexual harassment affect the
mental health of employees. Physical and mental health of a person is closely connected to each
other and this is the reason that when an employee faces sexual harassment it also influence

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his/her physical health in the form of headache and sleep disturbance. According to a report
presented by Tourism accommodation of Australia hospitality is the fastest growing industry of
the economy (Aha.org.au, 2013) and therefore the study of selected topic becomes more crucial.
Requirements of Law
 Work Health and Safety Act 2011 (Cth) ensure a safe and healthy workplace for workers
in Australia. According to the provisions of this act, employers are required to provide a
workplace to employees that are free from issues such as sexual harassment. The main
motive behind the development of the act is to secure the health and safety of employees
at the workplace. Being a federal act, this legislation is applicable to all the six states of
Australia in addition to the states act.
 In order to discuss the States Act in the matter of Sexual Harassment, this is to state that
all the states have developed their different legislation. Anti-discrimination Act 1991
(Qld) is the legislation developed by the Queensland government which deals with sexual
harassment in the state (Adcq.qld.gov.au, 2019). Similarly, the Anti-Discrimination Act
1977 (NSW) is there to prevent sexual harassment in this state. Section 22B of this act
says this is unlawful for the employers to sexually harass an employee or any other
person who is seeking employment with the same (employer). In the same manner, other
states also have their legislation that covers risk hazard of sexual harassment.
 Sex Discrimination Act 1984 also addresses the issue of sexual harassment in Australia.
The vicarious liability provision of this act is a significant one to study here that is
mentioned under section 106 of the act. As per this section, if an employee commits an

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act of sexual harassment and employer do not do anything to stop such behavior of that
employee, then the same may held liable due to vicarious liability (Austlii.edu.au, 2019).
 Anti-Discrimination Guidelines for the hotels and accommodation industry: - These
guidelines are developed on sexual harassment that is applicable to all the hotels of NSW
state. As per this policy, it is the responsibility of the employer to keep his/her hotel free
from sexual harassment in a way of dealing. Further, the guidelines say that hotelier
should inform the staff members that any incidents related to sexual harassment against a
customer or any other staff member will not be tolerated. In conjunction with this, hotel
owners and managers should develop the policies regarding acceptable conduct by the
staff while dealing with customers and other staff members
(Antidiscrimination.justice.nsw.gov.au, 2019)
 Code of Conduct developed by the International Labour Organization: To address and
prevent sexual harassment at workplace, international labour organization also released
certain code of conduct and guidelines. These guidelines are applicable to all the
organizations and provide the manner in which an employee, as well as a third party,
should respond to the incidents of sexual harassment. Further, the guidelines also outline
the cost of sexual harassment for employees, employers, and society (International
Labour Organization, 2019). These guidelines require that to prevent the issue of sexual
harassment, employers should make a commitment, and should create awareness in
addition to address the issue.

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Standard industrial practice
Hospitality industry of Australia is going ahead to deal with the issue these days. The
above-mentioned legislation and guidelines prescribe the nature in that an organization should
deal with the issue. Development of a code of conduct is one of the efforts that Australian hotels
are showing these days in order to prevent sexual harassment issues. These codes of conduct
prescribe the visions and mission of the organization and the opinion of management regarding
this issue. Chapter 6 of the Australian Human Rights Commission is developed on the topic of
prevention of sexual harassment at the workplace. It prescribes a code of conduct for the
employers and many of the hotels and restaurants are taking this code as a reference in their
practice (Humanrights.gov.au, 2019). HRH group of hotels, lantern hotels, and many others are
examples of hotels that are promoting the code of conduct related to this issue in their practices.
Anti-harassment training is another measure that hotels are adopting these days. In these training
employers and manager, teach the staff how they can report the issues and to whom they report
the incidents of sexual harassment. In addition to this, hotels are also being active considering
the background of employees and their criminal records at the time of recruiting them.
Conclusion
After having a discussion on the selected topic it is now clear that sexual harassment is an
emerging issue in the hospitality industry of Australia. It affects the mental health of workers in
an adverse manner and makes them difficult to continue with their jobs. Statistics have been
presented above which are crucial. Different authorities have provided different requirements
and provisions to prevent this issue and employers are required to consider them. At present time
this issue is required to be resolved. Further, the standard industrial practice adopted by the

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organization of subjective industry also been discussed. Although employers are being socially
responsible these days and trying to prevent this issue, yet more efforts are required in this
direction. Employers of hospitality industry of hospitality need to ensure that the workplace
provided by them is free from workplace health risk specially from sexual harassment in addition
to workplace safety hazards.

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References
Adcq.qld.gov.au. (2019). Sexual harassment. Retrieved From:
https://www.adcq.qld.gov.au/complaints/sexual-harassment
Aha.org.au. (2013). Australian Hotels: Contributing to economic growth and national
prosperity. Retrieved From: http://aha.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/AHA-
National-Policy-Platform-2013.pdf
Anti-Discrimination Act 1977 (NSW)
Anti-discrimination Act 1991 (Qld)
Antidiscrimination.justice.nsw.gov.au. (2019). Anti-Discrimination Guidelines for the Hotel and
Accommodation Industry. Retrieved From:
http://www.antidiscrimination.justice.nsw.gov.au/Documents/hotel_guidelines.pdf
Austlii.edu.au. (2019). Sex Discrimination Act 1984 - Sect 106. Retrieved From:
http://www5.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/sda1984209/s106s.html
Humanrights.gov.au. (2019). Chapter 6: Preventing sexual harassment: All reasonable steps -
Effectively preventing and responding to sexual harassment: A Code of Practice for
Employers (2008). Retrieved From:
https://www.humanrights.gov.au/publications/chapter-6-preventing-sexual-harassment-
all-reasonable-steps-effectively-preventing-and

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Humanrights.gov.au. (2019). Sexual harassment. Retrieved From:
https://www.humanrights.gov.au/our-work/sex-discrimination/guides/sexual-
harassment#sh
International Labour Organization. (2019). Code of Conduct and Guidelines to prevent and
Address Sexual Harassment in workplace. Retrieved From:
https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---asia/---ro-bangkok/---ilo-colombo/
documents/publication/wcms_525537.pdf
Sex Discrimination Act 1984
Topping, A. (2019). Sexual harassment rampant in hospitality industry, survey finds. Retrieved
From: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jan/24/sexual-harassment-rampant-
hospitality-industry-unite-survey-finds
Work Health and Safety Act 2011 (Cth)