CAMPAIGN Not on the menu


POWER IMBALANCE


Sexual harassment in hospitality is rife – as our survey shows


When Financial Times journalist Madison Marriage recently blew the lid off the President’s Club men-only charity gala where hostesses were repeatedly sexually harassed by wealthy and powerful men, Britons were shocked.


But just ask virtually any hospitality worker and their surprise would hardly register.


One hostess who is a Unite member told of a 10-hour shift she recently completed at a corporate away day for City workers in London.


“I did not get a break or the chance to eat over those 10 hours. I earned £8.50 an hour, had my bottom pinched four times and was asked about my sex life more times than I care to remember over expensive pastries and coffee that cost more per head than my hourly rate,” she told the iNews.


Nilufer Guler, a waitress and Unite rep, also explained to uniteWORKS just how common sexual abuse is in her industry.


“It’s totally and completely normalised,” she noted. “Just the other day, a customer very forcefully brushed his crotch against a waitress. Women are constantly being told by management to wear short skirts, to shave, that their hair isn’t okay.


“Managers impose on women workers hugs and kisses and threaten them if they don’t do exactly as they’re told,” Nilufer said. A poll commissioned by the BBC in December – the most in-depth of its kind


– surveyed thousands of UK workers about their experience of sexual harassment at work. A shocking 40 per cent of women and 18 per cent of men reported that they had been sexually harassed on the job.


And a new and ongoing Unite survey of hospitality workers has found the problem to be even greater in the sector.


Not on the menu Preliminary findings of the Not on the menu survey show that a full nine out 10 hospitality staff have experienced sexual harassment at work.


Of those who reported they were sexually harassed at work, more than half said the perpetrators were members of the public and another 22 per cent said they were harassed at the hands of a manager.


Third party harassment from customers and clients is a particularly pernicious problem because previous legal protections for workers were scrapped by the last Tory- led government.


Section 40 of the Equality Act 2010 held that employers would be liable for third party harassment if there were two previous incidents of harassment (not necessarily from the same person); the employer was aware of the harassment; and the employer didn’t take reasonable steps to prevent the harassment.


But in 2013, Section 40 was repealed even though 70 per cent of respondents to a government repealing it.


consultation opposed 20 uniteWORKS Spring 2018


Despite the pervasiveness of sexual harassment in hospitality, so many workers feel powerless to do anything about it – 77 per cent polled in the Unite survey didn’t know whether they had a sexual harassment policy at work and 60 per cent said they were unsure or lacked faith in their management to deal with a sexual harassment complaint.


These figures reflect Nilufer’s experience, who told BBC Breakfast Morning the reality of being in insecure work.


“There’s very little in the way of accountability processes,” she said. “There’s a big culture of bullying and people take advantage – especially of women, migrants, young people and students who work in these industries. They’re in fear of losing their hours; of losing their tips; losing their pay.”


Unite national officer Rhys McCarthy explained that it is the power imbalance implicit in jobs with little security – which dominate hospitality – that gives rise to the pervasiveness of sexual harassment in the industry.


“The exploitation endemic in the job manifests itself as sexual harassment – the reality is if you’re on a zero-hours contract, and you complain, you basically don’t get the job. We must tackle the rock-bottom terms and conditions in hospitality so people feel secure enough to speak out when they’re harassed.”


Unite hospitality coordinator Charlotte Bence added that the culture in the sector


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