One of Sydney’s top bar and restaurant groups allegedly pushed female staff out of the company after reporting sexual assaults, encouraged staff to have sex with patrons and use drugs on duty.
Add articles to your saved list and come back to them any time.One of Sydney’s top bar and restaurant groups has been hit with claims it pushed female staff out of the company after reporting sexual assaults, encouraged staff to have sex with customers and take drugs while on shift, and discriminated against women as it built up a hospitality empire that now spans six venues across the city.
The bartender, who asked not to be identified because she is pursuing legal action, reported the incident to NSW Police.She said she was “driven to breaking point” by the company, which initially offered her counselling but then subjected her to performance reviews. When she asked to move to another venue, Le Foote, she had to take a pay cut and then had her hours reduced after she began suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder while at work.
Another Hubert bartender said she was sexually assaulted by a colleague at home. She said she was told by her supervisor the next day that it was her fault for drinking and that she was a “square peg in a round hole”.“The people that are making money are doing it off our broken bodies,” she said. “This industry that I have given so much to has completely f---ed me over.”
Forte said Swillhouse had a no-drinking and no-drugs policy on shift but did not address claims about regular cocaine use at Hubert. The Parisian bistro in the Sydney CBD has won a Good Food Guide chef’s hat for the past two years. One male bartender said the company’s policies encouraged “loose” behaviour. He said little consideration was given to how the behaviour would affect female employees, given there was a “blanket ban” on hiring women in the bar’s first years.
The sexual harassment continued after meetings with a human resources representative and upper management.“She felt completely helpless because they wouldn’t give him a warning there were no efforts made to investigate it.”“Unfortunately, the details of the claim provided to senior management were incomplete and inaccurate, so while the bartender was relocated, the matter was not addressed as thoroughly as it should have been,” he said.
“We can confirm that while we want our employees to be positive and engage with our customers to give them a great experience, they have never been encouraged to have sex with customers,” he said. Forte acknowledged the terms were used at his venues, describing them now “as offensive, derogatory and juvenile”.
“He then started asking me what kind of underwear I was wearing that night. I refused to answer and attempted to ignore him as I kept serving. Then he started groping my ass before shoving his hand in the back of my shorts from the leg and inserting his fingers inside me.” When the company began mandatory sexual harassment training in 2022, the bartender was too distressed to remain in the seminar after the host, an external consultant, claimed that sexual assault “doesn’t happen here”.
In 2019, after a series of incidents, Forte reminded all staff to respect their co-workers and to report incidents to their managers. In the same year, Swillhouse appointed an HR specialist and implemented policies on sexual harassment for the first time. “This email is tough to write,” he said. “Due to several incidents at our venues involving staff and alcohol, we have had to decide to no longer offer this benefit. We understand that this benefit has been part of the fabric of our business and a considerable part of our culture.
In one post, Swillhouse executive Toby Hilton is pictured alongside Forte who straddles the bar in his underwear. Hilton said “from memory … we were trying to recreate a photo by Jean-Claude Van Damme”.
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