Female defence workers say sexual harassment not addressed after MoD allegations

Female defence workers feel little has been done to address sexual harassment more than a year after whistleblowers sounded the alarm about serious problems at the Ministry of Defence, a leading trade union has said.

A survey of female members of the Prospect union working in defence showed a falling level of confidence in action to deter sexual harassment, from 47% in January 2024 to 39% in February 2025.

Prospect said it was calling for an “independent, solutions-focused inquiry with sufficient authority to deliver a very necessary shock to the system” in a letter to the defence minister Alistair Carns.

About 60 senior women at the MoD wrote to the department in 2023 to allege sexual assault, harassment and abuse by male colleagues. Before and after the change of government, unions have been urging the department to take more action.

The letter, first reported by the Guardian in November 2023, included claims that women had been propositioned, groped and touched repeatedly by male colleagues in a workplace culture the civil servants said was “hostile to women as equal and respected partners”.

Since then, more women have come forward to Prospect and other unions, including one MoD civil servant who told of being subjected to three separate incidents of sexual assault by male colleagues.

Sue Ferns, the senior deputy general secretary of Prospect, said: “More than a year has passed since a series of disturbing revelations about the extent of sexual harassment in the MoD and wider defence sector, and women do not feel that anything has changed. In fact, in a number of respects things have worsened.

“Nothing less than a wholescale, top-down culture change will make this a sector that women feel safe working in. Our view is that an independent, solutions-focused inquiry is the best way to deliver the shock the industry needs to change.

“The international situation has not been this perilous in a generation. We need the best people working in defence and we need to get the best out of them. That is not going to happen if 50% of the population are being made to feel ill at ease due to the culture of misogyny and harassment.”

The Prospect data found that 57% of respondents were not aware of any action having been taken in the past 12 months to raise awareness of the harms of sexual harassment at work, and 46% of workers surveyed said that their employer had taken no action to tackle sexual harassment in the past year.

Confidence in the effectiveness of action taken to deter sexual harassment fell from 47% in January 2024 to 39% in February 2025. The fall is sharpest at the MoD arm’s-length bodies, where confidence has fallen from 46% in 2024 to 29% in 2025.

Confidence in reporting incidents of sexual harassment fell in all organisations. In 2024, 65% of respondents felt confident to report an incident of sexual harassment, which dropped to 58% in 2025. In the MoD, confidence fell from 63% to 55%, in MoD arm’s-length bodies from 61% to 56%, and in the private sector from 72% to 67%.

A majority of respondents still viewed behaviours in the defence sector as toxic and inappropriate, but this was down from 65% in 2024 to 58% in 2025.

A survey by the union last year showed that nearly 60% of respondents had personally been sexually harassed, with a similar proportion witnessing unwanted behaviours.

This follow-up survey was conducted to identify whether perceptions or attitudes had changed since then and to assess the effectiveness of measures implemented by MoD leaders.

The MoD has been approached for comment. At the time of the original letter from 60 MoD women, a department spokesperson said: “No woman should be made to feel unsafe in the Ministry of Defence and this behaviour is not tolerated. We are committed to stamping this out and we continue to encourage anyone who has experienced or witnessed this kind of inexcusable behaviour to report it immediately.”

It subsequently said: “Sexual harassment is completely unacceptable, and we are committed to stamping it out wherever it is found. We encourage anyone who has experienced or witnessed this kind of inexcusable conduct to report it immediately.

“As part of our plan to address instances of unacceptable behaviour, we launched a review of our complaints procedure in consultation with external bodies, including trade unions who are able to input.”

Since October 2024, employers have had a duty to take “reasonable steps” to prevent sexual harassment of employees.