Eideard

One of Australia’s largest supermarket chains has come under fire for an online job ad that specified that “no Indians or Asians” should apply…The ad, which sought cleaners at a Coles supermarket near the Tasmanian capital of Hobart, sparked condemnation after it was posted Sunday…

Coles said the offending ad was placed by a cleaning subcontractor without the company’s knowledge, in a written statement from spokesperson Jim Cooper.

“Coles is a proud, equal-opportunity employer and at no time have we ever issued the directives contained in this ad.”

The company said it was “extremely concerned to learn of the ad and its contents” and has terminated the subcontractor’s services as a result. It said it will also retrain its cleaning contractor on equal opportunity employment policies.

The ad has since been removed from the popular Gumtree classifieds website.

“I’m certainly going to look at commencing an investigation into what’s happening—the role of Gumtree, what Coles’ role was, and find out more details about the subcontractor,” said Tasmania’s Anti-Discrimination Commissioner Robin Banks…

In addition to media reports, Banks was alerted to the Coles ad through a post to her personal Facebook page. This showed that the community cares about fighting discrimination, she said.

Fast reaction time is half the battle against bigotry – if and when a government is serious.