Insurance – Positive Outcome
August 2008
Rainbow Wellington members will be aware that we have been trying to negotiate with the international insurance company ING for almost two years over the supplementary questionnaire they use when offering health or life insurance to gay men.
To reiterate the issue: a number of our members found that when they applied either for health or life insurance, or to extend their coverage to a new partner, and they identified as gay, somewhat to their surprise they received a supplementary questionnaire. This surprise turned to anger in some cases when they were asked: “Have you ever participated in male to male anal sexual activity” and “Are you currently participating in male to male anal sexual activity?” Some of those understandably affronted by this brought their concerns to us.
Our own investigations and analysis quickly established that asking such questions was almost certainly a breach of the Human Rights Act (although that has never been tested). That had to be a matter of concern.
We first took those concerns up with the Human Rights Commission in the context of a seminar they were fortuitously conducting into the operations of the insurance provisions of the HRA a decade on from the promulgation of a set of guidelines for this area. From this it became apparent that only one major company seemed to be involved viz., ING. We therefore took our concerns to them direct but with no result. We then formally referred the matter to both the HRC and the Privacy Commission (this latter because we considered the questions asked to also be in breach of the principles of the Privacy Act). Regrettably, after an initially encouraging response, the Privacy Commission declined jurisdiction.
Following further discussion with the HRC we returned to ING who initially were adamant in sticking to their guns. The break through seems to have come when we cited the form of words used in such circumstances by the insurance industry in the United Kingdom. After consulting their re-insurer ING have decided that they will remove the offending questions from the point at which they reprint their standard questionnaire form and replace these with two other questions: “Do you have Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) or are you carrying the HIV virus or antibodies to that virus” and “Within the last five years have you been exposed to the risk of AIDS, or HIV virus or antibodies to that virus?”
This is within the law and avoids the highly offensive personal nature of previous questions.
We have congratulated ING on their ultimately positive approach to this problem. Our advice to members contemplating taking out insurance with ING to take into account the offensive nature of their questionnaire is consequently withdrawn.
But it also emphasises a further point. Campaigns of this sort conducted by Rainbow Wellington can be effective and have successful outcomes and are not just hot air as is sometimes suggested. But it is also important to bear in mind that the more GLBTI people we can claim to represent the more impact our campaigns will have and the more clout we will carry at the corporate and political level. The message from that seems clear enough: make sure you become a member of Rainbow Wellington
Tony Simpson
Chair