To refuse to be a witness against colleague??

Exactly. Prime example of double standards.

She didn't see the groping incident, so would have been lying if she said she had. Hearsay is not evidence.

I don't think that the sight of a bit of Marks and Spencer's lace and midriff is comparable to a hypothetical erect penis.

She has confirmed that the employee was very drunk and needed to be helped out, however. Which she did see and was involved in.

It wasn't a man. Men flashing cocks are predatory pervs, women flashing bras are not.

I feel this will need to be repeated everything someone shrieks 'if it was a man!'

as long as you're ok with the male colleagues flashing their penises at women with no sanction, have at it.

But you are hugely unreasonable not to give a factual statement about what happened.

Everyone who is saying 'What if the genders were reversed'. The genders aren't reversed so it doesn't matter, men and woman are held to different standards and the dynamic is completely different when it comes from a young female member of staff, doesn't mean it's right but both can be true.

How does the older male college feel?
How was everyone else behaving? Was everyone else drunk?
You're only being pulled into meetings about it because they knew you were sober?

If you have to attend a meeting about it, I would keep it brief and factual. Annoying for you because you haven't done anything wrong.

She sexually assaulted someone and then flashed someone else. You really think it's snitching to tell the truth? In which case i hope nobody ever does it to you. The company didn't get her drunk, she did that herself. It's pathetic to be unable to handle your drink to that extent.

When i was sexually harassed at work, some weak minded people like you also stood by and wouldn't say what they'd witnessed. That led to him keeping his job with barely any consequences, while i got to develop mental health problems as a result.

Remind me of a work do about 10 years ago, I was pregnant so not drinking. And the head of finance. Called the COO a gNGEr cnt and punched him. Lights out. Goodnight Vienna. As the ONLY sober person in the only one HR would take an account from. Wild times. Both were fired but the COO for incompetence rather than fighting!

She didn't just get a bit carried away, she got paralytically drunk and sexually assaulted people.

I once worked at an office where one woman regularly and consistently sexually harassed male colleagues. Constant boasting of sexual adventures, touching and groping all totally unwelcome and uninvited.

Even men deserve to work in an environment where they don't have to put up with this unwanted sexual 'banter', it's assumed that because they are men they probably don't mind it, and might even enjoy it, and too bad for them if they hate it and feel dirty and uncomfortable.

Go to the meeting and just answer the questions they ask, and let them decide what measures they are going to take.

So you lied and helped cover up sexual assault. If I were in your shoes I would be incredibly ashamed of myself. I'm guessing you're the type to sleep soundly though.

You have to tell the truth and let others decide what happens. What if you stay quiet and she does something like that next year? There will be no record that this is a pattern of behaviour. As pp have said, no one poured the drinks down her. She needs to take responsibility for her own actions.

THIS. I had this exact situation with a colleague - groped two male members of staff and management attempted to brush it away. As a woman who has suffered assault in the past this made me feel very unsafe. Colleagues and I reported her and she had a warning. Gone in six months for doing the same thing again.

Sexual assault is assault and shouldn’t be minimised. You only need to state the facts, the judgement is for others.

Err, yes? I’ve already said that.

Sounds like you’d really love that

How would you feel if the male colleague had grabbed her breasts or crotch and exposed himself? If she did what you said and you witnessed it and have been asked to give your side that’s what you should do, just like you would if it had been the other way around.

Well done OP @Pukkajones mumsnetters tend to be "whiter than white" on here. Everyone in my experience has got a bit too drunk at a works party and she clearly was totally smashed. We had it happen at one works party where they gave too many free drinks and hired a comedian who egged everyone on. So many fights, people going home with each other, someone picked up the MD, people swinging from the beams it was wild. And they changed the Christmas party set up after so it never happened again. I've seen worse behaviour on works trips. Pretty sure your colleague will be mortified and I'm sure there was no malice in her actions. Everyone makes mistakes.

This. She clearly should have controlled her intake but stable door/horse. If it had been a drunken man OP who groped you and/or bared all what would you say/want to happen?

I completely get why you’re apprehensive. I would hate to get someone I like in trouble but what she did was not ok. If were to hold men to a standard the same must be done for women. If a male colleague you vaguely like brushed their hand against a woman’s crotch I think you’d have no issue in reporting what you’ve seen.

OP, I really hope that you never find yourself in a position where you are relying on the kindness and decency of strangers for anything more than telling you the time.

If you had witnessed the groping then I definitely think you should have told them the facts, but bra flashing is not so serious, nothing like a man flashing his penis.

Someone played our boss's head like a bongo at one party and nothing happened to him - reckon our boss felt it was his own fault for giving us so much booze.

The OP had better hope that no one witnessed her observing her colleague’s behaviour. Surely lying about this incident would be a sackable offence?

I don't think this kind of behaviour is acceptable from a man or from a woman. Being drunk is no excuse, and wouldn't be in a court of law.

I don't understand why you lied. Either you think what she did wasn't very bad...in which case, why not just tell it as it is? Or you think it was really bad, so why would you try to cover it up?

If a male worker grabbed a woman's private parts and exposed his own private parts at an office party, he would quite rightly be held accountable for this. I don't see why women shouldn't be held to the same standard.

If people aren't able to control themselves when they're drunk, then they should avoid drinking.

I don’t like the way you describe your HR having an actual problem because there was a punch up as if this isn’t a problem at all.

If the role was reversed or if it was your partner who was groped would you feel the same? Because she’s a woman and is generally nice is the bar for acceptable behaviour lower than it would be for a man grabbing his female colleagues arse?

Your attitude is terrible, saying you haven’t got time for it? Now you’ve lied it might get still get you in hot water if others say they saw her groping someone and flashing her boobs and they all say go ask Pukkajones, they witnessed everything and were much closer to everything!

What’s done is done but I feel sorry for your male colleague who was groped and whose colleague is so dismissive of it