Allison Bailey v Stonewall - Employment Tribunal hearing

[ickky]

The Tribunal will start on 25th April at 10am. If you would like to view online you need to send a request for access as early as possible.

Send an email to

[email protected]

The subject heading of the email request should read

“MEDIA OR PUBLIC ACCESS REQUEST – Case number 2202172/2020 - Ms A Bailey – 25th April 2022.

Then ask for the pin for the online access.

You will be contacted with instructions on how to observe the hearing.

I have sent a request but haven't had anything back yet. Hopefully nearer the time.

I was thinking the same, Jules.

I used to be a legal clerk and can't get my head around how that bundle would leave the office in that state.
The senior partner simply wouldn't have accepted that standard.

If this is Stonewall's tactic then I'm happy to keep supporting Allison in any way necessary, including her fees.

Why the fuck the judge doesn't sanction this multi-million pound organisation for behaving so contemptuously I really don't know. Or will it affect costs awards at the end?

I hope all costs are ultimately payable by Stonewall.

Argument for SW/GCC for maintaining constraints on public accessibility to the bundle are:
that the public can understand what the issues are and what the evidence is from the core bundle; and
this would mean free availability of witness statements and witness evidence only needs to be made availalble for the duration of the case and no longer than that.

Is it just a winding the clock down/ delaying tactic?

The more time they spend arguing about this the less time there is for them to stand in front of BC and explain their actions?

Nominative determinism in action if Stonewall act like this?

Making sure you're muted and can't be seen is really easy.

Log onto the court web browser using the link in the email sent by the court.
This takes you to the conference URI/ Alias page and shows you the name that will come up when you join the conference.
Click Settings. Set camera to None. Set Microphone to None. Tick Mute microphone when first connecting. Tick Always preview audio and video settings before connecting. Click OK.

You are now muted and invisible. Every time you log out and log back on you will be required to check your settings (None/None) before you log on. The court will never hear you eating your cornflakes or watch you fiddling with your flies.

Isn’t it ironic that Ms Omambala, for SW, is arguing there has to be a cogent reason for 'going beyond the rules' when it comes to providing a bundle with all the evidence that everyone can see and understand. Remind me who said that 'getting ahead of the law' was a good thing?

IO (Ijeoma Omambala QC, barrister for SW): The purpose of the documents provided in this case is to enable the tribunal to make its decision, it's not to make life easier for journalists.

'Proudly going beyond the law' doesn't sound so good now?

Stonewall calls it's intranet facility 'The Wall'. That's tickled my Handmaid's Tailbone.

Essentially the arguments from IO are that Stonewall don't want their witness statements to be accessible once this trial is over, for "who knows what use over who knows what period of time".

Gosh, they're sounding very much like people with something to hide, aren't they?

Hmm. Sounds like they think they'll lose. What have they got to hide???

I'm wondering whether this is a very clever tactic by AB and BC. If there's one way to wave a massive flag to get journalists to flock to an event like a trial it's to get one party to say that free access to documents needs to be prevented.

100%

'not helpful to discuss how badly prepared the bundle is'

Is it not?

a simple matter of mental arithmetic?! To 6000 pages?!

Exactly at the moment IO is rubbishing BC's remarks about how hard it is to navigate the bundle, several people pop up in the chat box explaining EXACTLY how very hard it is…..

EJ's facial expressions are golden. I don't read anything into them but she has an amazing face.

IO: "witnesses should not be subject to comment or villification" and providing downloadable documents would risk this.

Talk about labouring the point.

I'd be worried about vilification if I was witness for Stonewall or GCC.

And now they’re going to labour it a bit more….

Yes let's remember who is subject to vilification.

Yes, SW aiming to make vilification more difficult is a first!