Transgender person wins Employment Tribunal

I do think the “toilet issue” will be tried at tribunal at some point. I’m not HR but I’m an in-house lawyer so do work with the HR team on these issues.

I’m actually not sure how I’d advise in a situation where we had a TIM employee and a woman complained about them using the women’s loos. I’d certainly seek expert advice.

Terfousbreakdown

How do you handle female employees who want separate facilities for purposes of dignity?

How about being complicit in ambushing female employees if they are not made aware of a male bodied employee sharing their facilities?

Focusing on the toilets: if a female employee complains to HR that having a trans woman in the female loos is violating their dignity, demeaning, humiliating and creating a hostile work environment...

And asked for the exemption in the Equality act to be invoked in order to exclude the trans woman ...

Then do you think an ET would be persuaded that this is a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim.

And if the female employee is fobbed off then would she have a sex harassment claim against the employer?

In relation to the first, it wouldn't be the ET's domain unless there were a constructive dismissal claim. The employer must not treat anybody unfavourably on the basis of gender reassignment, but also must not treat anybody unfavourably on the basis of sex.

If the employee were bullied out of work for raising a complaint then she would have a constructive dismissal claim on the basis of sex.

I can't imagine for one moment that a woman in her sixties who was working to fill up her pension gap would take 'old lady piss smell' or 'she's off to the toilet, again!' to a tribunal for bullying in the work place.

Well she certainly should - clear bullying and absolutely actionable.

Okay, I didn't realise that mansplaining was neutral.

But I don't think that was what I was doing really.... Just pointing out that a person's disapproval of something doesn't give them (in my opinion) the right to treat another person badly. Which is what BB was essentially saying by arguing that the tribunal was unreasonable.

Maybe I should hide this thread. It seems my views aren't particularly welcome on here.

Out of interest, @ProfessorSprout, what challenges do you see from a HR perspective?

I foresee a whole lot of potential pitfalls on my end, starting with the comparatively trivial (e.g. some 'perk of the job' events where employees routinely room share with colleagues of the same sex - all okay, so long as a transwoman accepts a single, but what if they argue they're being singled out?) to completely fundamental issues, such as my current employer actually having sex-based hiring and promotion targets which could soon become utterly meaningless.

Not to mention a whole array of operational issues. It's bound to get interesting!

Mansplaining is gender neutral. Bleugh.

To badly summarise it's someone telling people stuff they already know.

Like explaining that bullying isn't a right. ;)

As with many of these threads we all seem to have ended up in agreement..............:)

I wondered if you would get the mansplaining irony there.

Maybe I am being slow, but what do you mean by that? I am not a man. I said what I said because BB's response to the judgment was that it was unfair and she even justified the actions on the basis of the colleagues feeling uncomfortable. So I said that being gender critical does not mean a right to treat people badly in the workplace in the way that these people treated the claimant. I don't see that as mansplaining at all, especially as I am a woman.

@susanbunch
I wondered if you would get the mansplaining irony there.

@professorsprout
The project I am working on now has 58 countries, the naming conventions are never ending - the 'known as' name can be names 4 and 3 out of 5. Unless companies copy a passport name exactly NOTHING WORKS!

I've read the judgement and it seems perfectly reasonable. Horrible bullying and I hope Primark have made changes since.

" If I am wrong and being gender critical means believing that you have a right to use a name that someone doesn't want used and to repeatedly point out a person's biological sex despite being asked not to, then I will have to bow out of this because that is not my definition of being gender critical at all."

Quite so.

I have a tale about 'old lady piss smell' but it would not go down well on this thread, especially with Susan.

Well, why don't you tell it to us and then I can decide whether it goes down well with me or not.

At tax time I take a lot of requests from people who suddenly remember they need to use their legal name and want me to change their records. And then once the forms are sent I have to remember to go in and change it back or there is ALL HELL to pay.

I can't imagine for one moment that a woman in her sixties who was working to fill up her pension gap would take 'old lady piss smell' or 'she's off to the toilet, again!' to a tribunal for bullying in the work place.

Why not? That is disgusting bullying and I have seen workplace grievances based on much less than that. What do you mean by that comment? That comments like that should just be taken in good humour?

I have a tale about 'old lady piss smell' but it would not go down well on this thread, especially with Susan.

It was successfully resolved. But this was back in the 90s.

Why are you explaining to BB that people don't have a right to bully?

Because BB clearly disagrees with the findings of the tribunal here, despite not having heard any of the evidence from the witnesses. No trans person should be bullied at work- that is so far from what I understand being gender critical to involve. If you read the judgment, it is so clear that the claimant was bullied by these colleagues. Nobody should be subjected to that. If I am wrong and being gender critical means believing that you have a right to use a name that someone doesn't want used and to repeatedly point out a person's biological sex despite being asked not to, then I will have to bow out of this because that is not my definition of being gender critical at all.

Elenden. I have to keep apologising for the smell, sorry.

@ProfessorSprout

It really made me think through process impacts so thanks for bringing it up. Good idea to change the name though!

I think from an HR point of view we have to be very explicit that we can't use a preferred name in place of a legal name at all times.

I can't imagine for one moment that a woman in her sixties who was working to fill up her pension gap would take 'old lady piss smell' or 'she's off to the toilet, again!' to a tribunal for bullying in the work place.

@susanbunch

Why are you explaining to BB that people don't have a right to bully?

It's a clearcut case of bullying in my eyes - and, no, I'm not HR, but I'm a line manager and wouldn't condone this kind of behaviour in any of my teams - not because an employee is trans, not because of their weight, the fact that they talk in a funny way or because they're ginger or any other of the myriad reasons why people are treated appallingly.

Having said that, trans issues and the workplace could certainly turn into a bit of a minefield in the future.

I'm not sure how the women felt in this situation, but I won't judge them for their frustration, and I don't hold them accountable for protecting the feelings of the man who gives no care to theirs.

Oh, come ON. Frustration gives nobody the right to bully another person. Read the findings. They used the name Alexander, not Alex. Why are you re-writing what the tribunal found? They have no right to refer to the claimant by the wrong name.

Praying for the claimant because they have evil inside them? Seriously? I am sure there are many fundamentalist Christians who are 'frustrated' that gay people can marry and adopt children. Does that give them the right to treat them badly at work? No.

This was very clearly bullying in the workplace and no matter how short a time someone has worked somewhere, nobody deserves to be treated like that at work. Being gender critical does not imply a right to make other people feel bad. If someone tells you they are called Alexandra, you bloody well use that name when you address them and do not assume that you have a right to use a male equivalent. You also do not tell people that they have evil inside them.

It's people like you that lead to the gender critical movement being dismissed as bigots and transphobes. It seriously upsets me because it WILL undermine all the hard work in trying to get people to see the dangers with self-ID.

It is also obviously a case of their word against theirs.