McDonald's UK faces fresh harassment claims as watchdog prepares intervention

McDonald’s UK was facing a renewed reckoning over workplace conduct as the Equality and Human Rights Commission prepared to intervene again after hearing 300 reported incidents of harassment since the company was first hit by a BBC investigation in 2023. The case has become a test of corporate accountability: after years of promises, what changed inside the business, and how much evidence is there that conditions actually improved?

The 2023 BBC investigation heard from more than 100 McDonald’s workers in the United Kingdom who alleged sexual assault, harassment, racism and bullying across the chain. Later reporting said the claims implicated more than 450 McDonald’s outlets in Britain, underscoring how widely the allegations spread beyond a handful of sites.

McDonald’s UK chief executive Alistair Macrow told MPs that the company had recorded 75 allegations of sexual harassment in the previous 12 months. He said 29 people were dismissed and 47 claims were upheld with disciplinary action. In parliamentary evidence, Macrow described the new allegations as “abhorrent” and “unacceptable.”

The figures suggest a company trying to show it has systems in place to respond, but they also show how much remains unresolved. A legal agreement signed between McDonald’s and the Equality and Human Rights Commission in 2023 was meant to prevent sexual harassment, yet the watchdog’s latest tally of reported incidents indicates the problem did not disappear after the original scandal broke.

The pressure is not limited to regulators. More than 700 current and former workers have instructed the law firm Leigh Day to take legal action over claims including bullying, racism, sexual harassment and homophobia. With more than 450 UK outlets now linked to the wider legal action, the dispute has moved far beyond a workplace grievance and into a broader examination of how a global brand polices its own franchise network.

The allegations also echo McDonald’s history in the United States, where BBC reporting in 2020 said two employees in Florida filed a $500 million class-action lawsuit accusing the company of systemic sexual harassment. Together, the UK and US cases point to a recurring question for McDonald’s: whether discipline after complaints is enough, or whether the business has to prove it can prevent abuse before it starts.