We consider any form of bullying, harassment or victimisation to be unacceptable behaviour. Behaviour described as bullying or harassment is not confined to the behaviour of senior staff towards junior staff, or staff members towards students. It can be behaviour between staff members of the same level, junior members of staff towards senior members of staff, or students who demonstrate these behaviours to other students or to members of staff.
What is bullying?
Bullying is persistent offensive, intimidating, malicious or insulting behaviour which may involve the misuse of power through ways which have the purpose or effect of undermining, humiliating, denigrating or injuring the recipient.
Bullying usually involves a repeated course of behaviour, often in the context of authority or status. Power does not always mean being in a position of authority but can include both personal strength and the power to coerce through fear or intimidation. Bullying can take the form of physical, verbal and non-verbal conduct.
Some examples of bullying include:
- Shouting at, using profane language, being sarcastic towards, ridiculing or demeaning others
- Taunting or making derogatory remarks about an individual’s appearance, or using insults as a way of humiliating others
- Deliberately ignoring or dismissing the views and opinions of others or avoiding someone
- Deliberately excluding an individual from meetings, work or study groups, networks or communications, or decision making without a good reason or encouraging others to do the same
- Deliberately withholding information which can affect an individual’s performance or attainment
- Setting unmanageable workloads or unreasonable deadlines
- Overbearing and intimidating levels of supervision
- Deliberately undermining an individual’s performance with constant criticism
- Deliberately undermining an individual by saying things or acting in a way that makes others question their professionalism, knowledge, abilities or work ethic
- Spreading malicious rumours or gossip about an individual
What is cyber bullying?
Cyber bullying is the bullying of another person using the internet, mobile phones and other digital devices. Cyber bullying can also take the form of posts on forums or social media, text messages, emails, messaging apps, chat rooms and gaming sites.
Some examples of cyber bullying include:
- Extensively criticising others in emails or messaging apps, or subjecting others to such criticism during video calls, or phone calls
- Excluding others from online/hybrid meetings, or ignoring or dismissing others during online/hybrid meetings
- Excluding others from online games, activities or groups
- Sending offensive comments or threats in emails or via messaging apps
- Posting negative comments or spreading lies about others on social media
- Impersonating someone in order to post negative comments or spread lies about others on social media
- Posting embarrassing photos or images of someone on social media
- Sending malicious or offensive messages on social media, chat rooms or gaming sites, often referred to as ‘trolling’
- Voting for or against someone in an abusive online poll
What is harassment?
Harassment is unwanted physical, verbal or non-verbal behaviour related to a relevant protected characteristic, which may intentionally or unintentionally violate an individual’s dignity or create an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment. In discrimination law (Equality Act 2010) there are 3 types of harassment:
- Harassment related to certain protected characteristics
- Sexual harassment
- Less favourable treatment of an individual who has submitted to, or rejected sexual harassment, or harassment related to sex or gender reassignment.
The relevant protected characteristics are age, disability, gender reassignment or gender identity, race, religion and belief, sex, and sexual orientation.
Harassment may consist of persistent behaviour, although one single act can amount to harassment.
What is unwanted conduct?
The word unwanted essentially means the same as unwelcome or uninvited. It is not necessary for an individual to say that they object to the conduct for it to be unwanted, and in some cases, it will be obvious that conduct is unwanted because it would clearly violate a person’s dignity. Unwanted conducted covers a wide range of behaviour. It can include:
- Spoken words
- Written words
- Imagery
- Gestures
- Mimicry
- Jokes or pranks
- Physical conduct
What is the meaning of ‘related to’ a protected characteristic?
Unwanted conduct ‘related to' a protected characteristic has a broad meaning. It includes situations where the individual experiencing the unwanted behaviour does not have the protected characteristic themselves, provided there is a connection between the behaviour and the protected characteristic, for example, where the unwanted conduct is related to the individual’s association with someone with a protected characteristic.
Some examples of harassment include:
- Unwanted physical contact including touching, hugging, pinching, grabbing, brushing past someone, or invading their personal space
- Making offensive comments, jokes or gestures about an individual’s gender or gender identity
- Mocking, mimicking or belittling an individual with a disability
- Ageist, racist, sexist, homophobic, biphobic, or transphobic jokes or comments
- Making derogatory or stereotypical remarks made about a particular ethnic or religious group
- Asking inappropriate or intrusive questions about someone’s sexual orientation
- Outing or threatening to out someone as, lesbian, gay, bisexual, or trans
Bullying and harassment are often confused, as some forms of bullying behaviour may also be considered to be harassment if the behaviour meets the definitions on this page.
Some forms of harassment can also considered to be a ‘hate incident or hate crime’. A hate incident or crime is any act of violence or hostility against a person or their property that is motivated by hostility or prejudice towards a person due to a particular protected characteristic.
What is victimisation?
Victimisation is unlawful under the Equality Act 2010. It occurs when an individual has complained (or intends to complain) about discrimination or has supported someone else in their complaint and has been subjected to a detriment as result.
For example: A member of staff gives evidence to an employment tribunal which supports their colleague’s claim of harassment related to sexual orientation. As a result the staff member is denied a promotion. In this case the member of staff has been subjected to a detriment because they gave evidence in connection with a claim under the Equality Act 2010.
For example: A student alleges that they have encountered racism from a tutor, and as a result they are being ignored by other staff members, which impacts on their studies and their health and wellbeing. In this case the student has been subjected to a detriment because they made the allegation.