Allison Bailey v Stonewall - Employment Tribunal hearing Thread 7

[ickky]

The Tribunal started 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

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The subject heading of the email request should read

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

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Abbreviations:

AB: Allison Bailey, claimant
BC: Ben Cooper QC, barrister for AB
SW = Stonewall Equality Limited (respondent 1)
IO = Ijeoma Omambala QC, senior counsel - barrister for SW
RW = Robin White junior counsel to SW - assisting IO
GC = Garden Court Chambers Limited (respondent 2) (GCC would be a better abbreviation)
AH = Andrew Hochhauser QC, senior counsel - barrister for GC
JR = Jane Russell junior counsel to GC - assisting AH
RM= Rajiv Menon QC & SH = Stephanie Harrison QC (jointly respondent 3 along with all members of GC except AB)
EJ = Employment Judge Goodman hearing the case
Panel = any one of the three panel members (EJ and two lay members)

Thread 1 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4529887-Allison-Bailey-v-Stonewall-Employment-Tribunal-hearing?

Thread 2 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4542466-allison-bailey-v-stonewall-employment-tribunal-hearing-thread-2

Thread 3 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4545725-allison-bailey-v-stonewall-employment-tribunal-hearing-thread-3

Thread 4 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4546945-allison-bailey-v-stonewall-employment-tribunal-hearing-thread-4

Thread 5 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4548160-allison-bailey-v-stonewall-employment-tribunal-hearing-thread-5

Thread 6 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4550451-allison-bailey-v-stonewall-employment-tribunal-hearing-thread-6

I seem to recall that there was a lot of huffing that it wasn't real, that it was fake new put about by rabid trans haring feminists.

Does anyone else remember that?

Ah thanks @CheeseComa!

Yes this is what I would do but I'm nowhere near a lawyer. I've just been dropped into a new work role and feel like I'm drowning. Perhaps I need to draw a few diagrams.

Hating, not haring!

I agree. DH (who is aware of, but not as intensely interested as I) and I were discussing this this morning. he is flummoxed by what GCC is getting out of first of all supporting and then doubling down on their support of SW. i was trying to explain about the context in 2018 when all this started and how SW was completely untouchable and to dissent meant certain death for organisations etc. But he can;t understand why GCC are willing to destroy their reputations by continuining to support SW. So then I talked about the affront they clearly feel to their own egos. and ... and ... and...

But none of the above actually continues to make real objective sense. What does SW actually have and continue to have that ostenibly sensible people and organisation just drink the koolaid and fight to drink more of the koolaid?

I am still working through the thread but saw this. no it is not common. It means the judge has spotted that the witness is being evasive and deliberately obstructive and thinks the answer is crucial.

I missed the whole morning because I had to do annoying but necessary stuff. Looks like a doozy.

Someone helpfully posted this summary of Allison B's statement improveifoa.org/2022/05/15/summary-of-key-points-in-allison-baileys-witness-statement-in-her-employment-tribunal-case-v-stonewall-and-garden-court-chambers/ which I just read and is a good summary. Thank you. Sadly I do not have time to follow the hearing other than here between bits of work.

Businesses like to virtue signal these days by adopting all kinds of causes which usually is pretty harmless - save the whale, equal rights for women but the trans issue is more complicated and in my view they are better off just concentrating on making profits. The Bible says do not show off about the good you do - let no one know you even give to charity and I thkn that is a pretty good principle rather than shouting to the roof tops about what causes you support and what a great human being you are.

I think this is all emotionally driven. They all feel angry and deeply hurt that Allison is suing them and have failed to engage their wise heads that would have led them to settle.

I doubt their counsel counselled them to settle cos £££

I am still working through the thread but saw this. no it is not common. It means the judge has spotted that the witness is being evasive and deliberately obstructive and thinks the answer is crucial.

This pleases me

I think it’s a situation that is truly multi-factorial: busy people, ignorance, the sheer unlikelihood of people trying to convince lesbians they have to shag males (they are doing so), AB’s personal characteristics meaning her opinion is marginalised, the influence of ostensibly ‘righteous’ causes and organisations, anger at being sued, professional rivalry when being placed under scrutiny, the fact that Chambers is a very unique environment without a formal hierarchy.

There could be more.

Well I think this case has confirmed that gender ideology makes even highly educated, normally very articulate people, who are skilled in picking holes in arguments and following logic, utterly lose their minds!!

This pleases me

Yes, it's encouraging to see the judge getting it. I'd hate to have her job.

It's a very horrible and rocky descent to tumble from confidence to shock, fear, anger and shame. And in public.

But none of the above actually continues to make real objective sense. What does SW actually have and continue to have that ostenibly sensible people and organisation just drink the koolaid and fight to drink more of the koolaid?

I don't know, but clearly they have it, because so many organisations have fallen for it.

I suspect it lies in things like the deliberate mangling of language which means that people don't understand what eg a queer trans woman actually is. And they think they're in a minority in not getting it, or that they are behind the curve in not getting it. Any of it.

Youngsters seem to be able to grasp it, and so other people think they are perhaps missing something?

Plus, it seems to me, certainly, that some of these barristers haven't at all grasped the implication of what it means in terms of women's rights.

You see it in below the line comments. People say why do you care, it's so unimportant.

They really don't get it.

So they're minimising its impact and importance, whilst outsourcing their understanding of it.

And then that's where stonewall come in.

They can think it all for you, and tell you that you will be progressive as a result.

Which is why people like MS can use sentences like I'm a woman, as part of their defence, when in reality, drilling into that assertion would make them as 'transphobic' as Allison.

They simply don't know what they are supporting. And that's their own fault.

Splendid analogy, thanks nauticant!

If MS didn't even know what a "trans lesbian" is, how can she claim to be remotely qualified to assess the meaning/content of a workshop for trans lesbians?

Yes, or

'Do you think sexual orientation is prejudice'?

MS to BC "You're taking me down a rabbit hole I'm not prepared to go down".

None of us were prepared to be taken down it, can we please crawl out now

AH: Judy Khan has a murder trial on Friday, so she must give her evidence tomorrow.

Why is everyone obsessed with rabbit holes?

Who is MHL? I thought she was GCC? She's turned up dressed a bit cas.

Well, we're on the other side of the looking-glass now aren't we tabby?

She is head of HR at GCC

MHL is an HR type, i think.

Also, I think it this is highlighting the deep cognitive dissonance people are willing to put up with as a defence mechanism when they thought they were morally right about something, and caused a major negative impact to someone else on the basis of that moral point (justified because of the rightness) AND THEN discover the possibility that they were deeply wrong, in fact, and caused someone enormous damage because of it. It's not an easy position to accept. It's publicly humiliating, personally mortifying and something that could possibly mean they need to question whether there are other actions they've taken on the basis of that same moral position that might also have caused damage to someone.

I think it's pretty human to fight against that, consciously or subconsciously or both.