International EEO News for May
May 2006
1. Dads Miss Out on Leave
Only 17 percent of eligible working fathers in the UK are taking the two weeks of paid parental leave they are entitled to, according to a November 2005 report published by the British Citizen’s Advice Bureau.
The report, Hard Labour, says around 440,000 working men annually are eligible for paid parental leave, but many of them are having their leave requests refused because they have not given their employer the required 15 weeks notice. The Department of Trade and Industry has said the time was necessary in order for employers to arrange cover. But only two weeks’ notice is required for a two-week holiday, and no more should be necessary for two weeks’ paid parental leave, the report says.
While men’s salaries remain typically higher than women’s, the low rate offered by the paid parental scheme often discourages men, the report says. At approximately $300 a week, it can represent too large a drop in pay for some families.
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2. Lesbian and Gay Recruitment Guide.
British lesbian and gay and bisexual rights organisation Stonewall has produced a national guide for students and graduates looking for work. It lists workplaces that have featured as Diversity Champions and good employers of lesbians, gays and bisexuals.
Starting Out: Lesbian and Gay Recruitment Guide builds on the success of Stonewall’s 2005 Workplace Equality Index. The index allows a comparison of employers to reveal those who demonstrate a commitment to providing diversity in the workplace.
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3. British Bullying
Workplace bullying is rife among HR managers, with over a half of survey respondents reporting being bullied, according to a survey carried out by British employment magazine Personnel Today. More than a third of respondents said the bullying had continued for over a year.
The report’s claim that bullying should be on every employer’s agenda is backed up by the 44 percent of victims who said bullying affected the quality of their work and the 56 percent who said they started to look for other work once bullying started.
Most senior managers denied that bullying was a problem in their organisation, but it is difficult to escape the conclusion that employers have to do better: only five percent of victims were able to solve the problem through their own actions. The survey was carried out as part of the Andrea Adams Trust’s Ban Bullying at Work campaign.
4. Young, Black, and Hungry
Some ethnic minorities in Britain are educating themselves away from their working class backgrounds at a faster rate than their white counterparts, according to research done by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Children from working class Caribbean, Black Afrian, Indian and Chinese families were more likely to reach professional or managerial positions than white British children from similar origins. The report also said that an expansion in number of those positions over the past 30 years has opened up more “room at the top”, making upward mobility possible.
However, minority ethnic groups still remain at greater risk of unemployment than their white counterparts from similar backgrounds.
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5. Glass Ceiling Lower for Black British Women.
Black women in Britain are two to four times more likely to be unemployed, and three or four times more likely to be working below their skill level compared to their white counterparts. The problem is most acute for young Pakistani and Bangladeshi women, according to Moving on up? Ethnic minority women at work.
All ethnic groups reported similar career aspirations and hopes for advancement. But the outdated, stereotypical assumptions were often “blighting” minority women’s careers during the hiring process, according to the Equal Opportunities Commission report. “The ethnic minority women surveyed were three times more likely than white women to be asked at job interviews about their plans for marriage and children - a violation of the Sex Discrimination Act,” the report said.
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6. Ageism in the HR Department
British research shows that HR professionals’ attitudes to older workers are slow to change. Over a third of the 1000 senior managers and HR experts surveyed saw older workers as “unreliable, unskilled and less adaptable to change”. This has unfortunate consequences for older workers, as the research also showed that 65 percent of organisations let the HR department take the lead in implementing anti-ageist policies, and over half of respondents did not believe their management was committed to eliminating ageism.
New age discrimination legislation comes into effect in Britain in October 2006. “It would appear that businesses have got a mountain to climb during the next 12 months if they are going to change negative attitudes towards age, which appear to be ingrained in UK workplaces,” said Cranfield School of Management research fellow Emma Parry.
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7. Older Workers Overlooked in Australia
Australian employers are also slow to recognise the value of older workers, according to a survey by leading recruitment and talent management firm Hudson.
The April Hudson Report surveyed over 8000 businesses and found only 40.7 percent of respondents were proactively searching for or trying to retain mature age workers. Older workers were being overlooked despite skills shortages and a workforce whose median age has increased by 5.8 years over the last two decades, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
Hudson CEO Ann Hatton said the statistics were a wake-up call to Australian business.
“Australian organisations need to pay serious attention to these Hudson Report results and act now or face the consequences further down the track. Even if some organisations are not yet struggling with the skills shortage, they soon will be as competition for skilled labour continues to increase," she said.
The IT and telecommunications industries fared the worst. Hudson’s IT&T director Martin Retschko said those industries tended to be poor at re-skilling older workers.