Barber in legal battle over refusing to cut girl’s hair
A SMALL-business owner could be headed to court after refusing to cut a girl’s hair and the child’s mother claiming he breached the Sex Discrimination Act.
Northern District Times
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A SMALL-business owner could be headed to court after refusing to cut a girl’s hair and the child’s mother claiming he breached the Sex Discrimination Act.
The Hunters Hill Barber owner refused because he is not trained to cut women’s hair. He also said the name of his business was obvious to most.
The dictionary definition of ‘barber’ is a person who cuts men’s hair and shaves or trims beards as an occupation.
The incident occurred before Christmas and Sam Rahim told media he told the mother about three women’s hair salons within a minute’s walk.
“The basis of the claim is that the barber shop refused to simply run the clippers through my daughter’s undercut, because she was a girl,” a spokeswoman from Inside Eagles law firm, where the mother works, said in a statement.
“Mr Rahim’s explanation was that he wished to keep his barber shop for boys and men only.
“The matter remains before the court and it is inappropriate for me to provide any further comment at this point in time.”
Mr Rahim is not alone in facing court. A Darwin barber shop received a discrimination complaint last month, a Brisbane barber shop has a complaint against it with the Queensland Anti-Discrimination Commission and a Melbourne-based barber had a complaint dismissed in February.
Goran Gulevski, who owns the Essendon-based barber shop, Dapper Gents Barber Shop, said the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission complaint also alleged gender discrimination.
“A woman came in and wanted a short haircut. We don’t do it so she put a complaint in,” Mr Gulevski said.
“Our staff are not qualified to cut women’s hair. What we got back was ‘what’s the difference’. We don’t know because we don’t do women’s hair.
“In our insurance policy it stipulates we are only covered for men’s grooming.”
That incident occurred in October and was only settled in February.
Despite it being dismissed, Mr Gulevski is now working with his lawyer to get documents drawn up that can be seen as customers walk in, stating their right to refuse service because they only cut men’s hair.
He believes it’s the only way to save them from potentially facing court.
“It is happening quite a bit. But we have a ‘no woman policy’.”
Barbering qualifications were introduced in Australia two years ago after a 31-year hiatus. To date there are just over 100 apprentice-qualified barbers in Australia. The rest have learned on the job from others here and overseas.
Australian Hairdressing Council chief executive Sandy Chong said the vibe among the hairdressing community was that they support the Hunters Hill barber.
“A barber is clearly for men and boys. The actual techniques and what is taught is seen as different,” she said.
“The finish from a barber is different to what is taught to a hairdresser.
“If he hadn’t done a good job, she could turn around and say so and want their money back.”
Ms Chong said that to be taken over the coals on something like this was hard.
She said some barbers have had shopping centre leases altered to specify ‘no females’ to cover them if a woman wants a trim.
One supporter of Mr Rahim’s said on social media, despite having a hairdresser for a wife, he’d make the trip across the city for his next trim.
“Just to show support,” he said
.
On Instagram, one woman said she was trained as a barber and had to retrain as a hairdresser. “I couldn’t agree more that they require two completely different skill sets,” she said.
Another likened the situation to someone going into a video store and demanding to buy a lounge.
“And then sue them because they don’t sell lounges,” they said.
On a Gofundme page, Mr Rahim said he was stressed over the complaint and the legal costs were more than he had ever anticipated.
“Thank you all so much. Thank you to everyone in the community and everyone that has messaged or made contact on our social media or directly in the barber,” he said.
His target is $50,000 and almost $14,000 has been raised in two days.