【Acrylic Painting by Dennis Tang】
(Paintings and Photos may not be relevant to the incident described)
The former Legislative Councillor Leung Kwok-hung, also known as “Long Hair”, has won his appeal against the Court of Appeal’s judgment to uphold the Correctional Service Department’s differential hair-cutting requirement for male and female inmates, prescribed in Standing Order 41-05 (“SO 41‑05”) issued by the Commissioner of Correctional Services.
Under SO 41-05, the “hair of all male convicted prisoners will be kept cut sufficiently close … for the purposes of health and cleanliness”, whereas “a female prisoner’s hair shall not be cut shorter than the style on admission without her consent”.
In a unanimous judgment written by Chief Justice Ma, the Court of Final Appeal found that SO 41-05 constituted differential treatment on the basis of sex, contravening the Sex Discrimination Ordinance (Cap. 480) as well as the right to equality guaranteed by Article 25 of the Basic Law.
Leung Kwok-hung is not a lawyer, but one can easily find his name in the many important Hong Kong case law. For those who are interested to learn more may try to search for “Leung Kwok Hung” with the Hong Kong case law database.
