CGD is not appealing Maya's judgment! Employment tribunal can proceed

[EmbarrassingAdmissions]

CGD are not appealing the Employment Appeal Tribunal judgment that gender critical beliefs are worthy of respect in a democratic society.

The judgment stands and is a legal precedent.

Next step: employment tribunal to hear the rest of the case.

twitter.com/MForstater/status/1409554171821531136

Shouldn't they be being more careful here if they're going to try and argue that they didn't sack Maya for her views/tweets?

Probably, yes.

yourhair just shows that emotion overrides sense. Company should have been on that straight away. In fact they would have known of judgement perhaps yesterday so should have warned their employees, on pain of sacking

@highame

yourhair just shows that emotion overrides sense. Company should have been on that straight away. In fact they would have known of judgement perhaps yesterday so should have warned their employees, on pain of sacking

Has anyone screens hotted them for Maya and her legal team?

I just saw that, plus some employee from CGD tweeting about them taking it back to court as the views she holds are not acceptable. twitter.com/seanbartlettdc/status/1409561103068172290?s=21

I note this tedious trope alongside the dollop of ignorance of the different rights in the UK.

I am grateful for that fight at a time when there are forces actively working to make the trans community - one that has led much of the fight for LGBTQ+ visibility and rights – ‘othered’ and live in the shadows. May they be unsuccessful. End thread.

From SB's bio, I strongly suspect that SB is in the US and does not understand how very different the situation is in the UK. I'm disappointed that the text implies that this is yet another person who is promoting the reversioning* of history as to who was responsible for which notable achievements.

archive of tweet thread: archive.is/FoftZ

*I'm sticking with reversioning rather than revision here because I read something recently about demagogues and the alternate universes they offer their followers.

Just seen this helpful summary from Audrey Ludwig in response to a question about why CDGDev didn't settle but are pursuing this case:

It is legally more complicated. If the evidence shows the manifestation of the belief is likely to cause unlawful harassment of other staff who are also protected, then not necessarily unlawful discrimination to terminate contract. Has to be balanced against Maya's rights.

twitter.com/AudreySuffolk/status/1409763430505066497?s=20

I thought Maya didn't have a colleague with that PC at the time in question?

I would have thought the CGD is creating a pretty hostile work environment for its female employees by pursuing this witch hunt and allowing the sorts of social media statements as archived above. Not an employment lawyer but couldn’t it be indirect discrimination?

I imagine standup that so many companies and organisations could be doing exactly that and should, if they have any sense, be looking very carefully at whether implementing Stonewall Law has been impacting on women.

Charities seem to be a law unto themselves and time the Charities Commission had a close look

Also, doesn't it look like they don't have a particularly robust social media policy in pace for their employees, so suggests Maya also wouldn't feel she had to watch what she said on her personal account? This is a Comms guy.

I think preventing women from discussing sex based rights as laid out in the EA could constitute discrimination.

It is important also to remember the context of Maya's tweets - she was tweeting in response to a government consultation on the GRA.

Yes, absolutely.

Way too late but as it's been bugging me - the judgement did specifically say that these views were worthy of respect, not just that the original judgment was wrong in saying they weren't.

Not only is it worthy of respect, but it is also one that is consistent with the common law... (quote from the judgement)

There is the technical argument that Maya is not entitled to the protection of the Employment Act because she wasn’t an “employee” within the meaning of the Act.. Any lawyers have a view on that?

I'm not a lawyer but I've read many times that the act protects those on fixed term contracts too although there may be a higher bar needed to win your case.

@howard97A that was dealt with at a earlier hearing (before the "belief worthy of respect" hearing) and it was found that Maya was an “employee” within the meaning of the Act.

Basically another case of an American employer failing to understand that UK employment law applies to them.

Audrey Ludwig:

Thread. In my work as a discrimination lawyer, I have often found the worst respondents (in terms of getting a settlement) to be from the public and third sector. Their leaders are so invested in own their self image as anti -racist, disablist, sexist (and so forth). So even even when presented with strong evidence that they or their organisation have caused unlawful discrimination and harassment, they are so horrified at the accusation, the mental shutters come down. This can mean they litigate beyond when commercially sensible… [continues]

archive.is/ay69S

@EmbarrassingAdmissions

Just seen this helpful summary from Audrey Ludwig in response to a question about why CDGDev didn't settle but are pursuing this case:

It is legally more complicated. If the evidence shows the manifestation of the belief is likely to cause unlawful harassment of other staff who are also protected, then not necessarily unlawful discrimination to terminate contract. Has to be balanced against Maya's rights.

twitter.com/AudreySuffolk/status/1409763430505066497?s=20

I thought Maya didn't have a colleague with that PC at the time in question?

And didn't she say she would absolutely use preferred pronouns out of courtesy. She just reserved the right not to. Which would tally with being able to talk about gender critical beliefs. Because you have to be able to identify sex otherwise you can't express the belief in understandable words.

I really like Audrey's threads on this stuff, as she's really good at explaining things in a way I can understand.

I've archived What The Trans! speculative thread on Maya's case:

Maya Forstater’s former employer has chosen not to appeal the recent court decision that said her views weren’t ‘Nazism’ and therefore were protected

But they are going to challenge her version of events in the employment tribunal. This should be fun

twitter.com/WhatTheTrans/status/1409695316085927944

archive.is/5Tkhq

I am a little surprised by some of the comments on that thread.

The usual hyperbole about GC people wanting to eliminate trans people, harass them at work, etc., etc. If I had a £1 for the amount of times that ludicrous rhetoric is trotted out I'd be a multi millionaire.

I know no more than the next person, but my guess is they will argue that:

• the tweets could cause a discriminatory environment for trans employees and clients. By allowing employees to manifest beliefs in that specific way on twitter- where many followers are from the same profession- they could not maintain an environment free from discrimination and harrasment, using a v broad definition of discrimination and harrassment. And possibly using a broad definition of the work place/ work environment. So it will come down to the specific tweets which were about the gra reforms, & philip bunce? The judge will have to decide if publishing opinions on twitter can create a discriminatory environment in the workplace, and if so, whether those specific tweets did so. I hope they don't win on this basis, or freedom of speech is buggered.

• or, whatever commitments she made to using preferred pronouns etc were not good enough, and so they couldn't be sure to avoid future harrassment.

• avoiding reputational and brand damage? Seems unlikely.

I think they will decide that the company could have explored more ways to balance the rights, and should not just have dropped her.

I expect what happened was that the American company didn't realise they had obligations to freelancers, got rid of her when it got tricky, and are now having to retro fit.

The fact that this is a US company says it all. They will be trying to push UK law in this case. They are giving it a go in so many areas but are coming unstuck for not understanding UK law or at least thinking it is in line with US law.

They're probably not appealing because the judge all but came out and said that despite his judgment about protected beliefs, Forstater would still likely lose a new tribunal. He made it very clear having a protected belief doesn't protect your actions, that you're still not allowed to misgender, harass or discriminate, and that employers are entitled to take action against you if you do, and indeed might face legal action themselves if they don't. Due to Forstater's excessive social media presence, she's left buckets of evidence all over that she's been doing exactly that, and honestly CGD are laughing at this point, why bother to appeal the appeal when they've basically been handed a route to win outright at a new tribunal.

I'm surprised honestly MF even is taking it to a new tribunal given the high likelihood she'll lose again, just on slightly different grounds. Better to stop now so she could stop on a (lukewarm) win. I honestly assumed that's what she could do, so then at least she could continue to crow about how a court declared her belief was kind of like homophobia but not quite as bad as Nazism, like that's some kind of triumph.

Cool story bro.

Judges end up with real difficulties because of the fact that freedom of speech comes into play and that is a very sticky subject. In fact Maya has a right to free speech and there is no right not to be offended in the UK. That has already been stated in UK law. The argument of hostile environment is really thin, is my guess manderlay. If the Tribunal found against Maya and this had an impact on free speech, you can betya the government would be looking at this very closely.

The proposals for Hate speech legislation will be unlikely to go forward because they are too draconian.