WORKPLACE DISCRIMINATION

The following are results from a survey taken of 70,000 people across 28 countries, including 2000 respondents from Australia in 2006 by the company ‘Kelly Services’.

46% of respondents in Australia say they have experienced discrimination of some type when applying for a job in the last five years.

The highest level of discrimination was in New South Wales where 52% reported discrimination when applying for a job, followed by Queensland (46%), Victoria (45%), South Australia (42%), and Western Australia (37%).

The major sources of discrimination identified by respondents were age, cited by 25%, followed by 9% for each of gender and racial discrimination, and 3% for disability.

Men had the highest level of overall discrimination with 50% facing prejudice when applying for a job compared with 43% of females.

Approximately 10% of women and 7% of men reported gender discrimination when applying for work.

Almost 48% of workers aged 45 or older felt they had been discriminated against on the basis of their age. But 26% of younger workers aged up to 24 also believed they were victims of age discrimination.

The survey found that some industries experienced higher levels of discrimination including IT, Engineering and Retail.

Only a small fraction of those who felt discriminated against actually took the matter further and most were unhappy with the outcome.

Almost 40% of those surveyed said they also experienced discrimination in their day-to-day working life.

Discrimination in the workplace is not ok. There are laws to protect you against unlawful discrimination. You should know these laws.