Sexual harassment is a safety issue!

Inside this issue...

-    Safety isn’t just about minding faulty machines
-    4 tips to prevent victimisation in your workplace
-    What’s happening at my offices?

Dear reader,

I hope you all enjoyed the extra day off attached to your weekend? I find we always make great plans to get out Gauteng and often just use the day to sleep in, or finish chores! Not very exciting, but sometimes necessary.

What I do like to do is catch up on any reading I missed during the week, and I managed to do so this time around.

Safety isn’t just about minding faulty machines…

I’ll admit, in our line of work, this is the majority of our focus. But, reading an article in IOL.co.za, I realised there are other issues in the workplace which we can define as “safety” concerns, and the penalties for ignoring them are just as severe!

Sexual harassment is a safety issue!

If you fail to protect an employee, i.e. fail to take the necessary steps to deal with sexual harassment, YOU can be charged with unfair discrimination on the grounds of sexual harassment (Section 60, EEA). This means that wherever you become aware of sexual harassment you should take the disciplinary steps needed without delay. Colliers Properties didn’t, and look what happened to them…

The case:

Christian v Colliers Properties (2005, 5 BLLR 479)

The facts:

Ms Christian was appointed as a typist. Two days after she started work, her boss asked her if she had a boyfriend and invited her to dinner. He also asked her to sit on his lap!

When she later objected to his conduct, the manager asked her if she was “in or out”. When she said she “wasn’t in”, he asked her why he should then allow her employment to continue. She was dismissed with two days’ pay. She referred a sexual harassment dispute.

The judgment:

In a default judgment, the Court decided that:

- Ms Christian had been dismissed for refusing her superior’s advances
- This was an automatically unfair dismissal based on sexual discrimination
- Newly appointed employees are as deserving of protection from sexual harassment as their colleagues who’ve been at the company longer

The employer had to pay the employee 24 months’ remuneration in compensation and additional damages and interest on the amounts it had to pay as well as Ms Christian’s legal costs.

It’s your legal duty to prevent your employees from being victimised at work. Here are four tips to help you achieve this…

4 tips to prevent victimisation in your workplace

Tip #1: Develop a work culture of caring for each other, where each employee realizes and understands the importance of compliance.

Tip #2: Implement an anti-victimisation policy as a condition of employment. Ensure ALL employees, from the top down, sign and understand it.

Tip #3: Give your company policy on victimisation sufficient exposure during employee induction/orientation, and open the subject to discussion.

Tip #4: Get employees to sign a “pact”, where they promise not to victimise each other. You can use this as evidence in settling issues around victimisation.

In the name of safety,

Christel Fouché
Editor-in-Chief: Health and Safety Advisor

PS: What’s happening at my offices?

So much exciting news has happened at our offices in the last few weeks, I just had to share it with you:

- Advantage ACT received the number 1 status at the Health and Welfare SETA – only one of two safety companies out of 250 organisations this is the highest award.
- I spent the afternoon of Friday 12 March assisting future woman in business as part of the CEO magazine initiative, sharing my business experience with them.
- Last Wednesday I went 3556m down a gold mine to do risk assessments for a client – the furthest I have ever been!