"I've heard more homophobia here in a year than I did in the UK in 10 years"

Friday 16 September 2016

For the first time ever a survey’s been carried out into the experiences of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in the workplace in the Channel Islands.

Whilst the findings show the islands to be more open and progressive in some respects, they also show respondents still feel they are strongly discriminated against, and would like to see changes to the law and in attitudes.

Whilst only 16% of respondents felt they had to conceal their sexual identity at work, compared with a national average of 34%, 21% felt their sexual orientation was likely to have a negative impact on their chances of progressing at work.

The survey also showed 12% of respondents felt comments had been made against them directly about their sexuality that made them feel uncomfortable, and a further 32% had heard comments made about workmates that made them feel uncomfortable.

One respondent told the survey: “I have heard more outright homophobia in the workplace here [the Channel Islands] in the last year than I did in 10 years in England.”

Another said: “In a previous job I was the only woman in a male environment. I can remember them joking one day about stereotypes. They went round the room picking on each other’s nationality saying, ‘you’re a jock’, ‘you’re a paddy’. When they came to me, they said, ‘you’re a dyke’. I had not come out at work and this embarrassed me. They made an assumption about my sexuality based on my appearance.”

When it comes to complaining about being sexually bullied or discriminated against 16% said they would feel comfortable about approaching their manager to get things sorted out, but that 20% felt they wouldn’t get any support.

As one respondent noted: “I came out to my boss as a lesbian a year ago, ever since then she has been sharing sexually explicit images of men with me. I find this offensive and embarrassing but I do not feel I can go to HR about it as the HR manager is friends with my boss, so I don’t feel anything would be done about it.”

Of those who did make complaints 25% felt no action was taken, 12% said a meeting was held with all the parties involved to try and resolved the problem, but only 12% said a full disciplinary investigation was conducted. Of those working in the public sector 13% said they were unhappy with the outcome of their hearings, whilst a massive 60% of those in the private sector were unhappy.