Prison authorities have defended their trousers-only rules for female inmates, telling a Hong Kong court that they are based on “inherent” gender differences.
Detained activist Chow Hang-tung, 39, is challenging the Correctional Services Department (CSD) prison rules that mandate female inmates to wear trousers throughout the summer, while men may wear shorts.
Representing the activist, who is awaiting her national security trial, counsel Jeffrey Tam told High Court Judge Russell Coleman on Monday that clothing created a “micro-environment” that was generally hotter and more humid than the ambient environment, trapping heat and preventing sweat from evaporating.
However, the CSD, represented by senior counsel Mike Lui, argued that the difference in clothing policy was due to a “basket of considerations” based on decades of prison management, which had identified what it called “inherent differences” between men and women.
Chow, who has been detained since September 2021, and her lawyers had earlier argued in a writ that the “deprivation of opportunity” to wear shorts for daytime activities “would have the effect of rendering the whole policy discriminatory.”
‘Custodial discipline’
The female inmates are deprived of an effective way to cool themselves, as they could potentially face a disciplinary offence for pulling up their trousers, Tam added.
Failure to comply with an instruction to wear their trousers properly can result in an offence, according to prison rules.
He also said that the restrictions on female prisoners’ attire, including requiring them to wear trousers in hot summer months, did not serve to create a humane, healthy, or decent custodial environment, as stipulated in the department’s commitments.
He argued that “there are no grounds for the CSD to imply that wearing shorts is not ‘decent’ per se.”
In his counter-argument, Senior Counsel Lui said that uniformity in inmates’ attire was essential to maintain a sense of “custodial discipline,” akin to how students wear school uniforms to “foster a sense of learning,” as “education is the prime objective.”
However, Tam pointed out that the CSD had not explained how wearing trousers – as opposed to shorts – served the aim of custodial discipline.
Tam said that thermal comfort was only part of the “basket of considerations” that the CSD had taken into consideration when formulating its clothing policies, adding that Chow and her team could not “single out” an individual aspect in their submission.
‘Inherent’ gender differences
Citing evidence from CSD clinical psychologist Elise Hung, Lui said that the existing policy was the product of “decades of CSD management” that had identified female inmates’ preference for trousers over shorts.
Lui also cited a 2021 legal challenge brought by Chung Suet-ying, a member of localist group Hong Kong Indigenous, which involved 53 female inmates who supported wearing trousers.
Their preference was based on “actual concerns,” including their working needs, the need to cover up scars and wounds, as well as leg hair and mosquito bites, he said.
Citing Hung, Lui said their preference for trousers was largely due to most female inmates’ concerns over “privacy and decency” that could be traced back to “inherent” historical, biological, and psychological differences between men and women.
Lui also pointed to an “absence of complaints” from Chow over the clothing rules, even though she had made 297 complaints between mid-August 2023 and September 2024.
But Tam said Chow’s challenge focused on the prison rule itself, rather than a specific decision, simply because the activist did not have any medical or religious grounds to challenge the regulations, as laid out in the prison rules.
Judge Coleman said that a decision would be handed down before June 13.
