II.
Case Overview
This report contains the investigation results for the complaint filed
by the TFAU on August 1st, 2023. It was prepared in accordance with
Article 2, Subparagraph 1 of the Organic Act of the Control Yuan National
Human Rights Commission, Article 7 of the Principles for Accepting and
Investigating Human Rights Complaints, and the resolutions of the 49th and
55th meetings of the 1st NHRC.
In its complaint, the TFAU states that the majority of Taiwanese
airlines require female cabin crew members to wear skirts, stockings, high
heels, and makeup, which the TFAU believes to be a violation of the
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against
Women (CEDAW), to infringe upon female cabin crew’s privacy, and to
potentially weaken their emergency response capacity in the event of an
evacuation. Furthermore, the current Gender Equality in Employment Act
only allows individual laborers and jobseekers to file complaints, resulting
in a lack of protection for workers as a class or group.
As a part of its investigative process, the NHRC interviewed cabin
crew, airline representatives, experts and scholars, government agencies,
and NGOs to determine whether the dress codes adopted by the six
Taiwanese airline companies constitute gender discrimination pursuant to
Articles 1 through 5 and Article 11 of CEDAW; Articles 2, 3, and 7 of the
International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
(ICESCR); and Articles 1 and 9 of the International Labor Organization’s
Violence and Harassment Convention (No. 190), among other international
human rights standards. More specifically, the aim of the NHRC
investigation was to determine whether the dress codes expose female
cabin crew to higher occupational health and safety risks and whether
government agencies have adequate safeguards in place to protect female
cabin crew from discrimination and to ensure that they enjoy the same
employment rights and occupational safety conditions as their male
counterparts.
In its investigation, the NHRC found that most Taiwanese airlines
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