Lloyd’s will impose tough sanctions, including potential lifetime bans, against people found guilty of sexual harassment in the London marketplace.

The measures are part of a “robust plan of action” announced last week after female executives told media they were victims of inappropriate acts on the premises.

CEO John Neal says a confidential channel for whistleblowers and victims to report harassment will be set up, and offenders will be named and shamed.

“When we do see instances of bad behaviour – and let’s hope they are infrequent – we have got to be public and decisive about the action that we take,” Mr Neal told Bloomberg. “People have got to be really clear that you cannot behave that way. Where we ban someone we should be very public about it.

“We’ve got to ensure everybody, whether it’s a woman or a man, should feel safe any time of the day doing anything that is associated with the Lloyd’s market.”

Lloyd’s intends to investigate the accounts of harassment given by 18 women in a Bloomberg Businessweek article.