Sport England and ukactive call on leisure centres to stamp out sexual harassment and intimidation
Sport England’s ‘This Girl Can’ campaign and ukactive have released guidance to help fitness and leisure facilities create safer spaces for women and girls to be active.
A guide has been produced to help tackle this gender activity gap, called ‘How to make your spaces safer for women: A call to action from the 51%’, which aims to address safety concerns experienced by women while getting active.
Putting the spotlight on the ‘Enjoyment Gap’ experienced by women, the latest initiative in November 2022 has reported that women have safety concerns about exercising in well-lit streets or public spaces alone after dark (65%), non-supervised public facilities (53%), and supervised public facilities (19%).
Sport England’s ‘Active Lives Survey’ shows that gyms and leisure centres are essential for contributing to women being more active, revealing that 7m women had taken part in facility-based activities, like using exercise machines or indoor swimming, at least twice in the past 28 days.
The survey also found that women’s activity levels remain lower than men’s, growing 1% compared to 2% for men.
It builds on the work of the previous guide, published in November 2021, by providing practical steps for facilities to help women feel safer.
Claire Edwards, head of campaign activation at Sport England, said: “This Girl Can exists so that all women feel they have the opportunity to be active in ways that they love.
“As is shown by our research, however, we know that more can and should be done to stamp out harassment and intimidation and support women in feeling safe when stepping through the doors of gyms and leisure centres.”
A mixed-methodology approach including a survey of more than 900 women conducted by Walnut for ukactive and This Girl Can provides the basis of this guidance, focusing on women’s experience of sexual harassment and intimidation in fitness and leisure facilities.
While only 5% of women reported feeling ‘unsafe’ in relation to sexual harassment and intimidation in gyms, four in 10 (42%) have experienced one form of sexual harassment or intimidation in their fitness or leisure centre – such as inappropriate comments, staring or encroachment of personal space. This almost doubles for those aged 16 to 24, increasing to 83%.
Among women who have experienced that, 76% said they had changed behaviour as a result – varying from going to the gym at different times or changing how they dressed.
Some 55% of women said it was clear how to highlight these issues at their leisure centre, and just a quarter who experienced an incident reported the behaviour – more than a third (39%) happened in the weight training areas.
Research shows sexual harassment is an issue with prevalence across society, with 71% of women of all ages having experienced some form of sexual harassment in a public space.
The guidance from Sport England and ukactive covers a range of practical advice, including the following areas for fitness and leisure facilities to help women feel safer and more confident:
- Checklists on what a code of conduct should include.
- Advice on how to communicate existing policies, codes of conduct and reporting procedures to members about sexual harassment.
- Details on what reporting processes should include and how to make sure they are easily accessible, so all members know how to report harassment and what to expect from the process.
“There is already a significant amount of exemplary work taking place across the sector to address what is sadly a societal issue,” said Marianne Boyle, director of membership and sector development at ukactive.
“With this guidance, our aim is to continue this journey of improvement and to increase women’s enjoyment of exercise by fostering an environment where they feel able to report incidents and feel safe in the knowledge that these issues will be taken seriously.
“Any form of harassment in gyms and leisure centres is totally unacceptable and we expect operators to take a zero-tolerance approach to sexual harassment and intimidation.”
