Foreign-born workers and those who describe themselves as struggling financially are more likely to experience violence and harassment in the workplace, according to Lloyd’s Register Foundation. The global safety charity is now calling for the widespread ratification of the International Labour Organisation’s (ILO) Convention 190 – an internationally recognised inclusive, integrated and gender-responsive approach for the prevention and elimination of violence and harassment in the world of work...

On a regional level, more significant differences were seen in Australia and New Zealand and Northern America, where foreign-born workers were 10 percentage points and 17 percentage points, respectively, less likely to tell someone about their experiences when compared to their native-born counterparts. This compares to Northern and Western Europe – a similarly high-income region – where the difference is only two percentage points. When asked for the reason for not telling someone about experiences of violence and harassment in the workplace, foreign-born workers were significantly more likely to cite not knowing what to do or being unclear on procedures.

In contrast, only 10% of workers in South-east Asia reported experiencing violence and harassment in the workplace. Bucking the global trend, the data from the World Risk Poll showed that foreign-born workers (93%) here are actually more likely to tell someone about their experiences when compared to those working in their country of birth (42%)...