More than one in three hospitality workers in Australia have experienced harassment at work over the past five years, according to a new legal analysis.
The report from employment law specialists Burke Mangan Lawyers reveals that 34% of workers in accommodation and food services have been harassed—just above the national average of 33%—with women in the industry facing particularly high rates at 40% compared with 24% of men.
The sector accounts for 9% of all workplace sexual harassment incidents nationally, despite representing 7% of Australia’s workforce, marking it as a high-risk industry for this type of misconduct.
Young workers are most vulnerable
More than half of harassment incidents (53%) occur at workstations where employees do their regular work—the highest rate of any industry examined. This compares to just 38% across all sectors.
The industry also sees harassment by younger perpetrators at more than double the national rate. In hospitality, 17% of those harassed reported their harasser was between 15 and 20 years old, compared to just 7% in that age bracket across all industries.
Workers aged 18 to 29—who make up a significant portion of restaurant and hospitality staff—experienced harassment at a 46% rate, yet they remain the least likely demographic to report it.
Reporting remains rare despite legal reforms
Across all industries, only 18% of victims make formal complaints, and 40% of those who do report say nothing changed afterwards.
The analysis found that half of organisations fail to inform workers how to make a complaint, while 40% provide no harassment prevention training at all.
“The failure to report harassment where young people are involved can allow the conduct to escalate,” said Lyndon Burke, founding partner at Burke Mangan Lawyers. “It can also cause disengagement, emotional and physical harm and longer-term instability in the workforce.”
New legal landscape creates employer obligations
Since December 2023, Australian employers have operated under a ‘Positive Duty’ requiring them to take reasonable and proportionate steps to eliminate harassment and hostile work environments.
The Australian Human Rights Commission now has powers to investigate and enforce compliance, and it estimates that workplace harassment costs the economy $3.8 billion annually, excluding hidden costs such as lost productivity, internal investigations, and reputational damage.
Burke emphasised that compliance cannot be superficial: “Employers must identify risks, assess their likelihood and magnitude and eliminate or minimise them. That means having robust policies, staff and manager training, and a clear complaints process.”
