Tory MP Maria Miller reveals she has been sexually harassed 'numerous' times

The chair of the Women and Equalities Committee also warned that sexual harassment was still endemic in many workplaces

A former Tory Cabinet minister has said she has been sexually harassed “numerous" times in her life and warned it was still happening regularly to women in the workplace.

Maria Miller, who chairs the Women and Equalities Committee, said harassment was still a reality, particularly in "very male-dominated industries", as she gave her support to a campaign to highlight everyday harassment.

Labour MP Jess Phillips also backed her comments in a Twitter post where she said she had been "sexually harassed and assaulted more times than I could fit in a tweet".

It came as Tory MP George Freeman urged fellow men to speak up over exploitation following the growing scandal over allegations of sexual harassment and assault by Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein.

Mr Freeman, who chairs the Prime Minister's Policy Board, said: "It’s up to us now boys: let’s make the Weinstein case a moment we resolve to take a stand against casual harassment/exploitation."

Asked whether she had experienced harassment personally, Ms Miller told 5 News: “Sexual harassment – of course, we all have.

“I probably speak pretty bluntly to people and it’s not something I would tolerate. But, I think, perhaps, if you haven’t got that level of self-confidence, then you won’t deal with it.

"I think you and I would agree that sexual harassment will happen on a very regular basis to women in the workplace. I mean it would be too numerous to give you an example.

“But, I do think that it’s something that, particularly in very male-dominated industries, women are still experiencing. We should not talk about it in the past tense.”

The former culture secretary also pushed for teachers to take a harder stance on harassment in schools, rather than dismissing inappropriate behaviour as "child's play".

Ms Miller said: "We don't give guidance to schools to report crimes when they happen because headteachers know that if there's drugs being used in a school, if somebody has broken in and stolen something, that is a crime. It would be reported to the police.

"I think head teachers need to take a very long hard look at their own policies to make sure that they are also seeing sexual abuse as a crime and reporting it, because at the moment, I think, it's being written off as being ... child's play and it's simply not that.

"It's a crime and it needs to be a reported."

A recent survey found by Girlguiding found rising levels of sexual harassment in schools, as 64% of girls aged between 13 and 21 said they had experienced sexual harassment in the last year - an increase of 5% since 2014.