Community Business is honoured to be one of the supporting organisation for the joint statement issued by Equal Opportunity Commission and Gender Research Centre of CUHK to urge the government to ensure equal opportunities for LGBTI people in Hong Kong by introducing an anti- discrimination legislation covering sexual orientation, gender identity and intersex status.

Business sector support for LGBTI anti-discrimination legislation

I’m Fern Ngai, CEO of Community Business, a not-for-profit organisation whose mission is to lead, inspire and support businesses to have a positive impact on people and communities. We are recognised for our thought leadership and work in advancing responsible and inclusive business practices in Asia, and one of the key areas of our work is diversity and inclusion.

Founded in 2003 and based in Hong Kong with a presence in India and the United Kingdom, Community Business works with companies of all sizes and from diverse industries across Asia, harnessing the power of business to drive social change.

Community Business is known for its groundbreaking work on LGBTI inclusion. This work is part of our ‘Creating Inclusive Workplaces for LGBT Employees Campaign’. I’d like to spend a few minutes to provide you with some of the background to this work and what takes this work valuable to our clients from the corporate sector, largely multinational companies with a strong commitment to diversity and inclusion. I will then speak about why LGBTI anti-discrimination legislation is important to the business community as well as to the future of Hong Kong as an inclusive, welcoming city for the world’s top talent.

Background

Community Business first started work in this area back in 2008. At that time however, understanding and adoption of diversity and inclusion was at a very early stage, and few companies had LGBTI on their agenda as a workplace issue. Sexual orientation and gender identity were seen as taboo subjects, poorly understood and rarely openly discussed in wider society – let alone in the workplace.

Over the last 9 years, this campaign has seen the establishment of our LGBT+ Inclusion Index and awards, publication of pioneering research, many events, and the facilitation of greater openness and discussion on this topic – not just in Hong Kong but across the Asia region.

Demonstrating the compelling business case in Hong Kong

In 2012, seeking to further highlight the business case for addressing LGBT workplace inclusion in Hong Kong, we conducted the Hong Kong LGBT Climate Study 2011-12. This representative study examined both the working population’s attitudes towards LGBT individuals as well as the first-hand experience of LGBT individuals working in Hong Kong. Like the EOC/CUHK survey published last year, our survey results showed that discrimination against LGBT individuals exists both at work and in society in Hong Kong. It also found that that lack of acceptance in the workplace harms productivity and the ability of companies operating in Hong Kong to attract and retain the best talent. This study provided companies with a compelling business case for LGBT inclusion.

Growing awareness and greater readiness

At the beginning of 2014, we believed that the dialogue on LGBT workplace inclusion had matured and that Hong Kong was ready for an Index that would engage and move organisations forward in their LGBT inclusion journey. As such, we launched the Hong Kong LGBT+ Inclusion Index in November 2014.

The Index is the first benchmark on workplace inclusion practices and initiatives for LGBTI employees in Asia. It provides companies in Hong Kong with a credible and robust tool to assess, progress and promote their efforts towards LGBTI inclusion. The Index combines learning from global indexes to ensure an approach suitable for companies operating in Hong Kong. Besides providing benchmarking information for companies, the Index provides a ranking of the top performing companies – which has proven to be extremely competitive. We ran the Index in 2015 and this year will be the second iteration. In 2015, we had 35 companies participating in the Index and this year we have 50, which shows a healthy growth rate.

LGBTI inclusion as an important business issue

These combined and sustained efforts have done much to raise the profile of LGBTI inclusion as an important business issue in Hong Kong and placed discussions around LGBTI issues centre stage in

Hong Kong. Increasingly, employers and employees alike have begun to understand the business case for LGBTI inclusion and a growing number of companies have started to take steps to address LGBTI issues in the workplace.

In the last few years, due in part to Community Business’ work and that of organisations such as the EOC and HKGALA, we have seen companies making great strides in advancing their company policies and practices, extending employee benefits to same sex partners, creating leadership accountability for LGBTI inclusion, establishing employee networks and ally programmes, and in supporting community events such as the Pride Parade, and Pink Dot. There is a very visible groundswell of commitment, support and activity among the business community for LGBTI inclusion. This is not only driven by wanting to be seen as an employer of choice, but for competitive advantage.

Why LGBTI anti-discrimination legislation is needed

In our own representative climate study back in 2012, 59% of respondents believed that it is the responsibility of the Government to promote greater inclusion on the subject of LGBTI in Hong Kong.

This is in line with the EOC/CUHK Study showing support amongst the general public for legislation.

We at Community Business concur with the recommendations of the Study which emphasizes that it is no longer a question of whether legislation should be introduced, but to move forward, focus should be on the scope and content of legislation.

We at Community Business also note that this is a historic moment, given it is the first time in Hong Kong that so many business organizations are publicly supporting the introduction of legislation. This highlights how far support has progressed in the last 10 years.

It is our firm belief at Community Business that if Hong Kong is to truly be ‘Asia’s World City’ now and in the future, discrimination of any kind should not be tolerated – it not only hurts the individuals being discriminated against, but it impacts on Hong Kong’s ability to attract and retain the best talent.

This is not only limited to overseas talent coming to Hong Kong to work, but also our home grown talent - young, educated people who are our future leaders who want to stay here to live and work.

As someone who has called this great city home for the last 30 years, I would like to see Hong Kong lead the way in Asia and the rest of the world in embracing diversity, inclusion and equality – and to achieve this, Hong Kong must move ahead with anti-discrimination legislation.