They called me a gweilo

A British-Australian former manager at Leighton Contractors (Asia) Ltd, told the District Court he was discriminated against by his colleagues who called him "gweilo" and excluded him from meetings because he does not speak Cantonese.

Francis Haden, a former director for explosive projects, is suing Leighton Contractors for discrimination after he was fired following his complaints against his colleagues, says a writ he filed to the District Court in 2018. The hearing stated yesterday before Judge Herbert Au-Yeung Ho-wing.

Haden is seeking HK$200,000 compensation for damage to his feelings plus loss of income since he was fired in February 2017 by Leighton Asia, which is commissioned for many of the city's infrastructure projects, including railways.

He said the contractor breached the Race Discrimination Ordinance. He also demanded a public statement and apology from Leighton.

Haden worked for Leighton Asia from 2010 to 2017, responsible for blasting during construction of the Express Rail Link.

In August 2016, he was in charge of blasting work for building the Tseung Kwan O-Lam Tin Tunnel, a joint venture between Leighton Asia and China State Construction Engineering (Hong Kong). He was dismissed from the post in February 2017.

Haden told the judge that he was on leave between January 28 and February 12 in 2017.

When he returned to work, he found he was excluded from an internal meeting on February 9 when he was off, without informing him, even though he was the manager of the blasting team.

His boss within Leighton even instructed his subordinates to handle the meeting and blasting work without notifying him, the court heard.

Haden said he should have known about the work as it was his primary responsibility.

However, Leighton's lawyer said the work was carried out as usual when Haden was on leave, with his subordinates handling it during his absence.

Haden responded that he needed to prepare relevant documents for the work.

His former boss in Leighton, Lai Chiu-nam, told the court that he did not have much contact with Haden.

Lai said he wanted to know about the progress of the blasting work but Haden was on leave at the time, so he asked other team members as they should have known about the progress.

Lai also said "gweilo" was a common slang term and he did not think the word was derogatory. He had worked with many foreigners, and sometimes he would call them "gweilo."

He also disagreed that the word was meant to separate Chinese and foreigners.

Leighton's lawyer argued that Haden's claim of racial discrimination was groundless and was only his own assumption.

Apart from the accusation of being frozen out at work, Haden also claimed in his writ that he felt unwelcome because he was not Chinese.

"On a number of occasions, the claimant heard references to himself and other non-Chinese working on the project as being 'gweilo' in a derogatory sense," the writ said.

Gweilo is Cantonese slang for a foreigner and loosely translates as "white ghost."

Haden claimed that more or less from the time he started working on the project - the Lam Tin tunnel - there was a "general, underlying hostility toward non-Chinese employees."

He also claimed to have once been shown an e-mail by the deputy project manager, who raised concerns about giving tunnel-drilling work to a non-Chinese as it would pose communication issues.

That indicated a preference for keeping non-Chinese workers from the project, Haden said.

Haden was given a letter to terminate his employment on February 28, 2017.

He went to the Equal Opportunities Commission on May 4, 2017, and as the contractor appeared unwilling to engage in conciliation talks, he turned to court action.

The hearing continues today.

sophie.hui@singtaonewscorp.com