NHS Sexual Safety Charter

NHS England has tasked Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) to encourage primary care providers, including community pharmacies, to sign up to the NHS Sexual Safety Charter.

In 2026, amendments to the Employment Rights Act will significantly strengthen the legal duties of employers, requiring them to take “all” reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment, and introducing employer liability for “third-party” harassment, where employees report harassment by customers. Future regulations will follow to define what the reasonable steps to prevent will be.

Whilst not a mandatory requirement, the NHS Sexual Safety Charter and completion of a self-assessment checklist against the Charter’s principles have been developed as support for NHS organisations and may help pharmacy owners get ahead of these legislative reforms. NHS England expects that many organisations will find using them will help achieve compliance with the new legal duties.

Community Pharmacy England was not involved in the development of the NHS charter and communications but, ahead of the new legislation coming into force, they encourage pharmacy owners to review the NHS Sexual Safety Charter, complete the self-assessment checklist and respond to their ICB.

ICBs will be following up with community pharmacies by the end of March to understand the initial engagement by the sector with this topic.

If pharmacy owners complete the national sign-up form and confirm checklist completion online, then ICBs should not need to follow up with those pharmacies.

Note, the ICB will not need to see the completed checklist, and any actions in the checklist do not need to have been completed prior to responding to the ICB.