ABSTRACT
This chapter opens with an account of the historical discriminations facing lesbian and gay employees, and ends with a discussion of sexual politics in public sector organizations. Lesbians and gay men in Britain have not only been excluded from the raft of anti-discriminatory legislation in modern Britain, but have also been subjected to legalized discrimination. The heterosexual/homosexual asymmetry means that it is only lesbians and gay men who are lambasted for flaunting their sexuality when their sexual orientations surface in public places. Lesbians talked primarily about subtle forms of persecution arising from straight gossip and social ostracism in the workplace which sometimes ended in their voluntary resignation. During the 1980s and 1990s, equal opportunities policies became the main vehicle through which employers pledged to filter out the inequalities in the labour market suffered by a number of status groups.
