Carter and Jones Chartered Accountants (Carter and Jones) is a mid-sized chartered accounting firm that is based in Adelaide. Several of its major audit clients are mining companies that work in remote locations in the north of the state. Given the importance of these clients to the audit firm, Carter and Joness staff who are audit seniors1 are eager to work on the teams that audit the mining clients. This is because these audits are the main way of obtaining the necessary work experience to get a promotion in the firm to the audit manager level (and ultimately a partnership in Carter and Jones). The locations where the mining audits are conducted are harsh with very basic facilities. The clients employees at these mine sites are exclusively male and when the audit staff visit these locations, they have to share the living quarters with the clients employees. Audit staff who have visited these mine sites in the past have commented upon the heavy drinking of alcohol that occurs there out of work hours and the telling of crude jokes by the clients employees. The locations also are environmentally hostile as the weather is usually very hot and uncomfortable. In addition, despite the fact that the clients have a history of reasonably safe working practices, the nature of the mining work does carry a higher than normal risk of physical injuries. The partners have stated that a consequence of Carter and Jones internal policy on health and safety is that, due to the nature of the mine sites, only male members of the audit firm are permitted to visit the mine sites to conduct audits. Recently one of the female audit seniors requested permission to participate in the mine site audits but was politely told by one of the partners that this policy is for your own good. Those sites are just too dangerous for women.

Required: Evaluate the ethics of the health and safety policy that Carter and Jones have implemented. Is the policy discriminatory? Explain your answer. If you believe that the policy is discriminatory, what changes could Carter and Jones implement to improve matters.