Note: this guide covers the general legal framework. It is not legal advice. For specific situations, consult a qualified employment lawyer or the ACAS helpline (0300 123 1100).
The Equality Act 2010 Definition of Harassment
Section 26 of the Equality Act 2010 defines harassment as unwanted conduct related to a relevant protected characteristic that has the purpose or effect of:
- violating the victim's dignity; or
- creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment for the victim.
Three elements are critical.
Unwanted. The conduct must be unwanted by the recipient. The recipient's perception is the test, not the perpetrator's intention. A perpetrator who claims they were only joking has not negated the harassment if the conduct was experienced as unwanted.
Related to a protected characteristic. The conduct must be related to a relevant protected characteristic: age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex, or sexual orientation. Pregnancy and maternity and marriage and civil partnership are not included in section 26, though parallel protection exists under other sections.
Purpose or effect. The conduct either has the purpose of violating dignity or creating a hostile environment, or the effect of doing so. A perpetrator who did not intend to harass may still have committed harassment if the effect was to violate dignity or create a hostile environment. Whether the effect constitutes harassment is assessed considering the circumstances, the victim's perception, and whether it is reasonable for the conduct to have that effect.
The Three Types of Harassment Under the Equality Act
The Equality Act defines three specific types of harassment.
Type 1: Harassment related to a protected characteristic. Unwanted conduct related to age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex, or sexual orientation. Examples include: offensive jokes about a colleague's religion, persistent comments about a colleague's age, derogatory language about disability.
Type 2: Sexual harassment. Unwanted conduct of a sexual nature. This includes: physical conduct (unwanted touching, assault), verbal conduct (sexual comments, innuendo, propositions), and non-verbal conduct (displaying pornographic material, sexual gestures). Sexual harassment does not require a connection to a protected characteristic beyond the sexual nature of the conduct itself.
Type 3: Less favourable treatment because of rejection or submission to sexual harassment. Where an employee is treated less favourably because they have rejected or submitted to sexual harassment, or harassment related to sex or gender reassignment. This protects employees from retaliation when they have rejected or complained about harassment.
The October 2024 Worker Protection Act
The Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) Act 2023 came into force on 26 October 2024. It introduced a new positive duty on employers to take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment of their employees.
This is a fundamentally different obligation from the pre-2024 position. Previously, employers could defend harassment claims by showing they had taken reasonable steps (the "reasonable steps" defence). Now, employers must proactively take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment, whether or not a specific harassment claim is made.
The consequences of breach are material:
- Employment tribunals can increase compensation awards by up to 25% where the duty has been breached
- The Equality and Human Rights Commission can take direct enforcement action, including issuing unlawful act notices and seeking court injunctions
- The FCA has signalled that breach will form part of conduct-and-culture supervisory assessment for regulated firms
What the EHRC Says About Reasonable Steps
The Equality and Human Rights Commission published statutory guidance on the all-reasonable-steps duty in September 2024. The guidance identifies the following as components of a reasonable-steps profile:
- Risk assessment specific to harassment in the employer's particular workforce context
- Clear policies that workers know about and that describe what harassment is and how to report it
- Training that is genuinely effective at preventing harassment, the guidance explicitly states that one-off awareness training is unlikely to be sufficient
- Structured reporting mechanisms that workers trust and can use
- Prompt and effective response to reported incidents
- Monitoring of the effectiveness of harassment-prevention measures
- Senior leadership accountability for workforce harassment-prevention culture
The training element is particularly significant. "Genuinely effective" training is explicitly distinguished from awareness e-learning. Tribunal practice through 2025 and 2026 has consistently read behavioural evidence rather than certificate completion as the test of compliance.
The Distinction Between Harassment and Bullying in UK Law
The terms harassment and bullying are often used interchangeably in workplace contexts but have different legal status.
Harassment has a specific statutory definition in the Equality Act 2010. It must be related to a protected characteristic or be sexual in nature.
Bullying is not separately defined in UK employment law. There is no statutory prohibition on bullying as such. However:
- Persistent bullying may breach the implied duty of trust and confidence in an employment contract
- An employee who resigns as a result of bullying may be able to claim constructive unfair dismissal
- Where bullying is related to a protected characteristic, it may constitute harassment or discrimination
- Where bullying causes psychiatric injury, it may give rise to a personal injury claim
ACAS guidance on bullying and harassment is available at acas.org.uk and provides practical guidance for employers and employees on addressing both.
What Counts as Sexual Harassment: Examples
The EHRC guidance and tribunal case law provide extensive examples. Sexual harassment includes:
Physical conduct: unwanted touching, patting, pinching, brushing against a person's body, assault, kissing, hugging
Verbal conduct: sexual comments about a person's appearance or body, sexual jokes, sexual banter, sexual propositions, asking about someone's sex life, making sexual noises, sexual comments on social media directed at an employee
Non-verbal conduct: displaying sexual materials (images, videos, posters), making sexual gestures, staring in a sexual way
Online conduct: sending sexual messages via email or messaging platforms, sharing sexual images, posting sexual comments on social media
The test is the recipient's experience, not the perpetrator's intention. "It was only banter" is not a defence if the effect was to create an offensive or humiliating environment.
Employer Responsibilities: Pre-2024 and Post-2024
Before October 2024, employers could defend a harassment claim by demonstrating they had taken reasonable steps to prevent and address harassment. The defence was reactive.
After October 2024, employers must proactively take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment. The duty exists independently of any specific claim. An employer cannot wait for harassment to occur and then respond. They must act preventatively.
For UK employers, this means reviewing their entire harassment-prevention infrastructure: risk assessment, policies, training quality, reporting mechanisms, management capability, and leadership accountability. Employers whose harassment training has been awareness-only e-learning need to upgrade to training that produces demonstrable behavioural change.
How Sidestream Helps UK Employers Meet the Duty
Sidestream's harassment prevention training is calibrated specifically for the post-2024 compliance standard. The design produces observable behavioural change, not awareness-certificate completion.
Key design features aligned to the EHRC reasonable-steps framework:
- Bespoke scripted scenarios drawn from the employer's specific workforce risk profile
- Professional actor ensemble producing realistic bystander-intervention and disclosure-response rehearsal
- Kirkpatrick Level 3 measurement architecture producing behavioural evidence rather than satisfaction surveys
- Six-week embedding architecture providing ongoing reinforcement (the EHRC explicitly expects this)
- Senior-leadership accountability structure addressing the leadership-behaviour dimension
For more detail, see our harassment prevention training London page and our DEI training London page. For the specific question of yelling in the workplace, see our blog post Is Yelling in the Workplace Harassment?
Frequently Asked Questions
What is workplace harassment under UK law?
Under the Equality Act 2010, harassment is unwanted conduct related to a protected characteristic (or sexual in nature) that violates dignity or creates an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment. Assessed from the recipient's perspective, not the perpetrator's intention.
What are the three types of harassment under the Equality Act 2010?
Type 1: harassment related to a protected characteristic. Type 2: sexual harassment. Type 3: less favourable treatment because of rejection or submission to sexual harassment or harassment related to sex or gender reassignment.
What did the Worker Protection Act 2024 change?
It introduced a positive duty on employers to proactively take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment, rather than merely respond to it. Tribunal compensation can be increased by up to 25% for breach, and the EHRC can take direct enforcement action.
Is yelling or shouting at work harassment?
It can be, if related to a protected characteristic or if it creates a hostile or humiliating environment. Persistent patterns of shouting directed at one person are more likely to meet the threshold. See our dedicated post Is Yelling in the Workplace Harassment?
What is the all-reasonable-steps duty?
The positive duty introduced by the Worker Protection Act 2024 requiring employers to take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment before it occurs. The EHRC's guidance defines the steps as including risk assessment, policies, effective training (not awareness-only), reporting mechanisms, prompt incident response, and senior leadership accountability.
What training satisfies the all-reasonable-steps duty?
Training that produces observable behavioural change, particularly bystander-intervention capability and disclosure-response capability, is more defensible than awareness e-learning alone. The EHRC guidance explicitly states that one-off awareness training is unlikely to be sufficient.
What is the difference between harassment and bullying in UK law?
Harassment has a statutory definition in the Equality Act 2010 and must be related to a protected characteristic or be sexual in nature. Bullying has no separate statutory definition, though it may ground other claims depending on circumstances.