City offers little help for domestic abuse victims in LGBT community
Those who suffer domestic violence in same-sex partnerships have few avenues for assistance and are wary of mainstream NGOs
While attitudes towards sexual minorities are slowly changing in Hong Kong, large numbers of the city's LGBT community are suffering domestic abuse in silence, a new study has revealed.
"[The Social Welfare Department] tends to emphasise a neutral stance. They say [they offer] services irrespective of gender, race or sexual orientation - but that doesn't help LGBT people. They need a service to be highlighted as LGBT-friendly," said Leung Lai-ching, associate professor with the university's applied social sciences department.
Leung spent a year conducting in-depth interviews with nine victims of same-sex partner violence and five organisations dealing with LGBT and domestic violence issues.
The main issues were a lack of awareness of problems faced by LGBT couples, and a lack of support for abused partners.
Many counselling centres in the city are run by religious groups, and while the Social Welfare Department has some counsellors who are "LGBT-friendly", the wait for an appointment to see them can be long. One interviewee said she waited a month for an appointment.
"I heard from social workers that there's not much training available for them from the Social Welfare Department," said Connie Chan, chairperson of the Women's Coalition, an LGBT organisation interviewed by Leung.