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

[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.

When joining the live tribunal please choose a non inflammatory/offensive name, everyone can see it in the chat - This is a court room, please behave accordingly.

The court chat function is there for official court purposes, not for observers, please don't use it unless you have a technical issue.

On the first page underneath where you put your screen name, select the video and mic that are not crossed out (top option), this is the courts vid and mic.

On the next page select NONE on the drop down windows for vid and mic, these are your own video and mic.

You must be muted so as to not disturb the hearing.

There is also live tweeting from

twitter.com/tribunaltweets

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

Gutted I missed MS. I need to catch up via TT on Twitter. I'll just have to imagine the tone and angst as I read it.

There really is a dark comedy to be had out of this saga.

And me. Again, I know this is real life and dreadful for Allison, but the way things have been done by GCC and SW is so farcical, the analogies to TV programmes (This Last fe, W1A) isn't surprising.

I'm free from work tomorrow and Fri, so have applied to observe. Didn't dare earlier, had too much work to do so just relied on TT and this thread. (gutted I had to miss seeing Allison's evidence and today, though)

Thank you all for the threads, made the tweets a lot more understandable (and entertaining!)

This Life, not This Last fe! 🙄

Why did a kimono-wearing foxy fool enter my head on reading this?

Do you know what, Charlie Tennent has a look of Joe about him.

I think I heard BC say 3 hours.

He said 5-6 hours for JK when they were stating that she couldn't spill into Friday as she has the murder trial, which was news to him.

Phew. Finally caught up with the days proceedings. My jaw has been on the floor reading about MS. It must have been quite something to watch it live!

Against my better judgement I have a teeny bit of sympathy because it seems clear they are so angry because their view of themselves as individuals and as a chamber is being severely challenged.

They believe themselves to be uber progressive and righteous in everything so the idea they might have discriminated horribly a black, lesbian woman and a colleague, on the basis of sexuality no less, is making them self implode.

At this point in the trial it seems to me that GCC are on shakier ground than Stonewall. I think despite some of the insanity on display from SW testimony it's still quite hard to definitively prove an A to B to C with them as puppet masters. I do think acting according to SW values was a reason for much of what went on but it's not left a clear cut paper/digital trail.

I feel like Allison could win against GCC but not SW. That said further testimony could change things, there is still a way to go.

People on here who handle professional conduct hearings and such…

Is BC as impressive in his focused questioning and persistent maintenance of politeness, as I think he is? Despite the strenuous efforts of some very experienced QCs (both in their normal roles and as witnesses), BC manages to maintain an unruffled demeanour and seems impervious to being pulled off-course while missing nothing.

I don't think it's only that Allison is a lesbian and from an ethnic minority. She's been open about being a victim of child sexual abuse. The offender was convicted. She doesn't do defence work. Surely anyone with a heart and a brain could understand why the "cotton ceiling" would be so upsetting for her?

The clerk this week is like a v courteous, tech savvy Dizzy Rascal!

Reading about the cotton celing was one of the things which most peaked me, so it was fascinating to look at MS ("I am a woman!") grappling with how to incorporate that within a kindness and accepting framework. I wonder what she would have done/said if it weren't all happening under the glare of a courtroom and a lot of £££ on stake. I wonder if she and Alison were friends wouldn't they have had a conversation about this?

For me, it is not just the complaints of TW not being able to form the kind of relationships they want (or even bluntly just have sex with women) but the scheming behind having workshops dedicated to overcoming the situation by (however you call it) coercion. Yuck.

I know a GCC barrister and IMO you are bang on here. The one I know seriously considers himself to be a lefty activist lawyer trailblazer.

He considers himself working class despite being second generation Cambridge and sending his own DC to independent school and treating his wife like a domestic appliance.

Also keen on peddling rape myths when defending in sex crime trials because he genuinely believes that women 'make that stuff up for attention'.

Hideous person who thinks he's on the right side of history.

Deleted his twitter the night before AB's trial started waves in case he recognises himself

Oh yes. I meant the clerks at GCC. This is Charlie Tennent

www.gardencourtchambers.co.uk/clerks-and-staff/charlie-tennent

Britain denied a visa to Julien Blanc, a PUA teaching workshops on how to manipulate women into having sex.

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/nov/19/julien-blanc-barred-entering-uk-pick-up-artist

To this day, I'm astonished that SW thought this Cotton Ceiling workshop A Good Idea. I can only think that if they consulted a focus group, there were few, if any, lesbians present.

I feel that GCC were hampered in their being barrister's in this case. They approached the matter of AB as if they were the barristers for Stonewall and so everything they did and said was with a positive outcome for their client, Stonewall. They were not capable of putting aside their allegiances and looking at the matter from a neutral standpoint and coming to an impartial judgement.

barristers

For those of you not able to watch:

I don't know what the other QCs we've seen are like on the other side of the table because I've never watched any legal proceedings except on TV but BC is an artist. He lures them in, gently, gently, he's quietly spoken and kindly. He has a big bushy gingery beard, slightly apologetic tone. He leads the witnesses into an corner and then traps them. Bang! They realise, too late, what has happened. And that's when they begin to crumble. And he keeps on with his gentle questions and they get more and more annoyed and then eventually totally lose their cool. And he brings it back down again and then ramps it up. And again. Until they totally lose it, blurt out something they didn't mean to say, and then he says "no more questions".

It is astonishing to watch. He is an absolute master and worth every penny I/we/Allison has paid.

Can anyone give me a bit more context for MS's "Everyone is entitled to sexual boundaries. I'm a woman, Mr Cooper!" please? I couldn't find it in the TT thread (possibly not looking properly) and as I joined the hearing about half an hour too late I missed it and really wish I hadn't.

twitter.com/tribunaltweets/status/1526875482951753728

Thank you! So the "I'm a woman" bit was a bit of a non sequitur?

I think the "I am a woman" was meant to signify empathy with the plight of other women possiblt being coerced into having sex.

(I miss-spelt Allison above, sorry.)

Ah, I see. I can imagine it now. Thank you!

I assume the sequence of events was:

2012 - Morgan Page runs Cotton Ceiling workshop, organised by Planned Parenthood Toronto, and there is an archived webpage web.archive.org/web/20120722002609/pleasureandpossibilities.com:80/programming/workshop-descriptions

Shortly after PPT realises that not everyone was onboard with "overcoming the Cotton Ceiling" and publishes their explanatory document

Pre-2019 - Morgan Page joins Stonewall. SW didn't do any due diligence but had they found about the Workshop they wouldn't have even blinked.

Late 2019 - MS finds the explanatory document which she takes as "one document to rule them all".