Georgia’s Ombudsman takes action against labour discrimination

Georgia’s Public Defender has challenged the country’s leading online employment website for using discriminatory wording on its job vacancy descriptions.

Public Defender Ucha Nanuashvili addressed www.jobs.ge and asked it to develop regulations that will eliminate posting gender-discriminatory wording on its webpage, as "such statements contributed to the development of discriminatory practices in labour relations”.

Research by non-governmental organisation 42nd Article of Constitution found that 71,360 job vacancies had been posted on the website from 2010 to October 2014.

In this time 10 percent of the vacancies used female-oriented language and 24 percent used wording more suited to males.

More specifically, the database revealed the word ‘pleasant appearance’ was used 1,589 times, the word ‘man’ was used 1,088 times, the word ‘stable’ 780 times and the word ‘woman’ in 607 cases.

Georgia’s Public Defender concluded that such statements contributed to the development of discriminatory practices in labour relations.

"Most of the statement published on the website www.jobs.ge contain a reference to a particular gender, appearance or marital status, which limits labour availability and the right for labour of the job seeker, putting them at a disadvantage compared with other people in the same condition,” noted the statement released by the Ombudsman’s office.

The statement also noted that because www.jobs.ge did not filter the vacancies that contained discriminatory words, it "was encouraging the employers to promote discriminatory vacancies”.