- 2012/11/15
Results of the action taken against discrimination. Don’t be deceived!
Discrimination based on gender, age, nationality, religion, language, origin, social status or views is not only a problem for a state but also for all of us. European Foundation of Human Rights is aware of this problem and has been fighting against it by directing applications to law enforcement organizations about illegal entries in the Internet.
You can learn a lot about discrimination by reading online job offers. Authors break the law without even knowing it. European Foundation of Human Rights (EFHR) is deeply concerned about the traces of discrimination in the offers, so we started to control them. There are already visible effects of our monitoring. Suspicious employers receive warnings from the Equal Opportunities Ombudsman in Lithuania (trans. Lygių galimybių kontrolieriaus tarnyba).
Article 11 of the Equal Opportunities Act states that in offers of employment, trainings or taking up a public service, it is forbidden to set requirements, with few exceptions, that give priority to some people on the basis of their gender, race, nationality, language, origin, disability, ethnicity or religion.
Despite the legal regulations there are still offers which contravene this article. There are a lot of discriminating offers on the website www.darbo.lt. For instance: “We will employ a nice, communicative, responsible and friendly woman”; “We are looking for a woman under 30 to be a shop assistant in a children clothes shop”; “We need a pizza maker – a woman”; “We will employ a woman to the position of a shop assistant and consultant”. There was yet another job offer to the position of a training assistant for a person under 24.
Employers claim that the main cause of putting discriminatory content in job ads is lack of knowledge about the law of the Republic of Lithuania and the requirements of the act passed by the State Commission of the Lithuanian Language.
EFHR hopes that the Lithuanian Equal Opportunities Ombudsman will also begin to monitor the Internet in search for illegal job ads what he was actually appointed to do. EFHR actions, however, point to the fact that those duties are neglected.
To help the entrepreneurs, EFHR has prepared a leaflet which explains how to legally write a job announcement.
The Foundation encourages you to report on job announcements that may violate the law. Thank you all who have already sent us information about this type of advertisements.
We encourage you to cooperate with us.
Tłumaczenie Marta Dubiel w ramach praktyk w Europejskiej Fundacji Praw Człowieka, www.efhr.eu. Translated by Marta Dubiel within the framework of a traineeship programme of the European Foundation of Human Rights, www.efhr.eu.
