Head of Trinity's Employment barristers, Jane Callan considers the findings from a BBC's Radio 5 Live's survey into harassment in the workplace.
Like a tsunami, the fallout from the Harvey Weinstein sexual harassment scandal has travelled across the Atlantic to hit Britain with devastating effect. The BBC survey showed that 53% of women and 20% of men have suffered harassment in the workplace.
Not only is this a serious blight upon the morale of the workforce affecting productivity and turnover of skilled staff, but the removal of fees to bring employment tribunal claims and the raising of compensation for injury to feelings in successful cases to a maximum of £42,000 in the most serious instances (plus other losses, such as salary or benefits) means that all employers, whatever their size and complexity, need to tackle this issue. It is imperative to review and if necessary, overhaul policies and procedures, and to train personnel in order to prevent or deal effectively with such behaviour.
Trinity's Employment team have highly skilled barristers with the experience and background which equips them to provide first class advice and assistance both in designing strategies to deal with harassment but also in navigating the pitfalls of any subsequent litigation. Given its size, Trinity's Employment team can offer barristers to match the complexity and cost proportionate to the issues involved.
Many of Chambers' 'Tier 1' employment barristers have been recognised in the recently published 2017 edition of the Legal 500: 'The employment group at Trinity Chambers is widely recognised for its expertise in equal pay disputes; other key areas of instruction include discrimination, whistleblowing and unfair dismissal cases.' Jane Callan ‘has a wealth of experience and sharp analytical skills.’ Helen Hogben has ‘particular experience in cases of victimisation and discrimination involving police forces and the NHS’ and is an ‘adamant and painstaking cross-examiner.' Also recognised are: Simon Goldberg ‘Very knowledgeable on complex areas of employment law’; Jamie Anderson ‘builds strong client relationships’; Jamie Morgan is ‘An excellent advocate who builds client rapport very quickly’; Richard Stubbs whose ‘recent cases include TUPE, discrimination and unfair dismissal claims’ and ‘sound advocate with the human touch,’ Antoine Tinnion.