Sexual Harassment Just Became Whistleblowing. Here’s What You Need to Know

Jun 12 / Julia Gidney
Essential Manager Training | 5 min read

An unnecessary complication?

Was it really necessary for sexual harassment complaints to automatically qualify as whistleblowing disclosures?

It’s a fair question  because on the surface, very little has actually changed in terms of rights. Sexual harassment was already unlawful. Compensation was already uncapped. Retaliation was already illegal and a claimant who wanted whistleblowing protection could already argue a breach of legal obligation.

So why did the Employment Rights Act 2025 go further?

This wasn’t about new redress

Redress for sexual harassment has always been available and always financially uncapped. What’s changed isn’t the remedy, it’s the pathway to it.

The amendment is best understood as political and cultural signalling: a recognition that the existing routes were too complicated and their complexity was putting people off raising complaints at all. 

For employers, this “simpler for the claimant” new focus could eaily mean “more complex for you.”  Maybe.  Here’s what’s actually changed.

Before and after: what employers need to know

Previously, a claimant raising sexual harassment had to actively frame it as falling within an existing whistleblowing category, most commonly, a breach of a legal obligation.

Now, sexual harassment is expressly capable of being a protected disclosure in its own right. The claimant still has to meet the existing whistleblowing tests: reasonable belief, public interest (this isn’t a formality, for instance, complaints that relate only to the individual making them don’t qualify) and appropriate recipient but the door is now explicitly open rather than requiring a workaround.

More claims or just more complex ones?

Previously, claimants had to make an early strategic decision about which causes of action to pursue at Tribunal. That uncertainty often meant the whistleblowing element simply wasn’t presented. 
Removing that guesswork is very likely to mean more Tribunal claims overall and more claims that combine grievance, harassment and whistleblowing elements simultaneously.

For an employer, that means potentially running multiple procedures: grievance, harassment investigation and whistleblowing process concurrently, on the same set of facts, each with its own legal requirements.  In practice, most genuine sexual harassment disclosures would already have met the whistleblowing tests under the old framework so maybe the change is more about clarity than substance and maybe no additional claims (or less claims than feared) will result. Only time will tell.

Interim relief becomes more accessible

Interim relief which is essentially the ability for a dismissed employee to remain on the employer's payroll pending a full Tribunal hearing, was previously only available to those dismissed for making a protected disclosure.

By bringing sexual harassment into the whistleblowing framework, more claimants can now potentially access this remedy. For employers, this means a potentially faster, higher-stakes financial exposure window even before a hearing takes place.

Automatic unfair dismissal

Previously, dismissing someone for raising sexual harassment could be unlawful but it wasn’t automatically unfair unless whistleblowing (or another automatically-unfair category) applied. 
Now, dismissal because of a qualifying disclosure about sexual harassment automatically triggers unfair dismissal protection. Practically, this can mean fewer defences available to the employer, faster routes to liability findings and, combined with interim relief, more significant immediate exposure

NDAs and the anti-silencing agenda

Previously, sexual harassment allegations that didn’t amount to a protected disclosure could potentially be covered by a non-disclosure agreement (NDA).
 Now, because whistleblowing complaints cannot be included in NDAs, more sexual harassment matters may also, as a consequence of these changes, fall outside what can be contractually silenced. This supports the broader “anti-silencing” direction of travel intended by legislators, though wider NDA restrictions in this area are still awaited and not yet in force.

This change doesn’t land in isolation

From October 2026, the duty on employers shifts from taking “reasonable steps” to prevent sexual harassment to taking “all reasonable steps” to prevent unlawful harassment, which is a much more onerous legal obligation.

Taken together, 2026 represents a two-stage tightening: first, the route to Tribunal via whistleblowing becomes more direct; then, the legal standard employers are judged against becomes harder to meet.

Employers reviewing either one of these changes should really be looking at both.

What this means in practice

The net effect is less about new rights or larger payouts and more about easing the pathway to tribunal for sexual harassment complainants, while increasing the procedural and risk burden on employers.

Employers may now find themselves running parallel processes, facing automatic unfair dismissal exposure and managing interim relief applications on cases that previously wouldn’t have reached that level before this change.


For organisations where reporting cultures and power dynamics are already under scrutiny - think Fire & Rescue Services, Chambers & the Bar, the Police and the NHS, getting the initial response right matters more than ever. How a complaint is received, who it’s escalated to and whether it’s recognised early that it potentially engages additional whistleblowing protections, may now materially affect the organisation’s legal position from day one.

Employers need to brush up on processes to handle both harassment and whistleblowing

Businesses are recommended to train their managers on recognising when sexual harassment allegations trigger whistleblowing provisions.  Also to amend policies to clarify policy precedent in the event of merged processes - so which procedure takes precedence and how do they interrelate?
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