SINGAPORE: A whistleblower has leaked on social media explicit e-mails despatched by workshop managers at car rental firm Ethoz Group – exchanges which can be in contravention of laws on employment practices.
The e-mails include sexual innuendos about women who had utilized for jobs at the firm. Some of the exchanges additionally included pictures of the possible candidates.
In one e-mail, the author mentioned: “Young and pretty one, good. But I will bring her home for personal use soon to generate my energy, and I will show her my long lasting energy.”
Another mentioned in a special e-mail thread: “If not… can consider to bring her (potential girlfriend) home for his private use.”
It will not be recognized when these e-mails had been despatched.
Screengrabs of eight e-mails had been posted on-line on Monday (Feb 7), 5 of them with pictures of the job candidates.
In one e-mail, the author described one candidate, whose photograph was hooked up, as “massage girl”.
Ethoz Group, which supplies motorcar restore companies and affords rental, leasing and financing of motor autos, confirmed the e-mails concerned exchanges between its workshop managers.
The workshop is situated in Tampines.
Cindy Oh, chief govt of Ethoz Group, advised The Straits Times: “We take the issue very seriously and will not condone such behaviour in our workplace.”
She mentioned the screengrabs seem to have been taken by former workers who used to work at the workshops.
The firm intends to conduct a full investigation and take acceptable disciplinary actions, added Oh.
Amarjit Kaur, a companion at regulation firm Withers KhattarWong who specialises in employment regulation, mentioned victims can accuse the workshop managers of harassment and inflicting alarm or misery.
This may very well be translated to contraventions below the Protection from Harassment Act (Poha).
Their actions is also in breach of employment guidelines.
“Given that these were managers who were assessing candidates with a view towards recruiting them on behalf of the company, the company may be found to have breached the Tripartite Guidelines on Fair Employment Practices for engaging in discriminatory hiring practices on the basis of a candidate’s appearance or race,” mentioned Kaur.
But she famous that it could be a legitimate defence if the managers consider the phrases utilized by them wouldn’t be seen by the victims.
“Given that the comments were made in a ‘workshop management’ e-mail group in respect of prospective hires who would not have access to the same and were not part of the company, the managers could seek to use this to shield themselves,” she famous.
Kaur mentioned the mere incontrovertible fact that the corporate e-mail was used won’t routinely make the corporate chargeable for the managers’ actions.
However, she added that the women can attempt to search authorized redress and acquire financial compensation in opposition to the perpetrators for offences below the Poha.
“However, the female candidates will face the obstacle of overcoming the defence the managers are likely to raise, which is that they had no reason to think that the words would be seen by the candidates,” she mentioned. – The Straits Times (Singapore)/Asia News Network
