UK police are investigating the Confederation of British Industry following allegations of sexual harassment and rape among staff at the country’s biggest business lobby group.
(Bloomberg) — UK police are investigating the Confederation of British Industry following allegations of sexual harassment and rape among staff at the country’s biggest business lobby group.
The City of London Police said on Tuesday that it approached the CBI after the Guardian newspaper last week reported allegations of sexual misconduct made by more than a dozen women who have worked at the group, including one who claimed she was raped at a staff party.
The probe is at a “very early stage,” Detective Chief Superintendent Richard Waight said in the statement. The force “takes all acts of sexual misconduct and violence against women and girls extremely seriously.”
The investigation plunges the CBI into further turmoil on a day the business group said it had fired Director General Tony Danker over unrelated allegations of misconduct. The developments in recent weeks have prompted concern from British businesses it represents and led the UK government to pause engagement with the group.
The business lobby group said it was liaising with the police and would cooperate fully with any inquiries. In a statement earlier Tuesday, it also said it had suspended three employees pending further investigations into a number of allegations.
‘Serious Failings’
“The allegations that have been made over recent weeks about the CBI have been devastating,” the lobby group’s board said. “While investigations continue into a number of these, it is already clear to all of us that there have been serious failings in how we have acted as an organization. We must do better, and we must be better.”
The CBI appointed its former chief economist, Rain Newton-Smith, as its new director general. Danker had already stepped back last month at the start of a probe by law firm Fox Williams LLP.
The board reiterated that Danker was not the subject of any of the more recent claims in the Guardian, but said that his conduct fell short of that expected of the leader of the group.
Fallout
Danker, for his part, said on Twitter he was appalled to learn last week of the “awful events” that occurred before his time in office. While acknowledging he’d made colleagues uncomfortable, he said many of the allegations against him had been “distorted” and that he was shocked to learn of his dismissal “instead of being invited to put my position forward as was originally confirmed.”
–With assistance from Jonathan Browning.
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