Allison Bailey v Stonewall - Employment Tribunal hearing Thread 10

[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

Thread 7 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4551757-allison-bailey-v-stonewall-employment-tribunal-hearing-thread-7

Thread 8 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4552521-allison-bailey-v-stonewall-employment-tribunal-hearing-thread-8

Thread 9 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4553181-allison-bailey-v-stonewall-employment-tribunal-hearing-thread-9

Allison Bailey - claimant (4-9, 11-13 May)

Witnesses for the claimant:

Dr Nicola Williams - Fair Play for Women (29 April)
Dr Judith Green - A Woman's Place (29 April)
Kate Barker - LGB Alliance (3 May)
Lisa-Marie Taylor - FiLiA (4 May)

Witnesses for the respondents:

Stephen Lue - barrister for GCC (3-4 May)
Zainab Al-Farabi - ex Stonewall (10 May)
Kirrin Medcalf - head of trans inclusion Stonewall (10 May)
Leslie Thomas - barrister at GCC (13 May)
Sanjay Sood Smith - Stonewall (16 May)
Shaan Knan - LGBT consortium - on STAG (16 May)
Rajiv Menon - joint head of chambers (16-17 May)
Maya Sikand - barrister at GCC (17-18 May)
Mia Hakl-Law - HR senior for GCC (18 May)
Judy Khan - barrister at GCC (19-20 May)
Charlie Tennent - clerk at GCC (20 May)
Luke Harvey - clerk at GCC (20 May)
Louise Hooper - Barrister at GCC (20 May)

To come?
David Renton - barrister at GCC (20 May, to continue on 25th May)
Stephanie Harrison - joint head of chambers
Michelle Brewer - barrister at GCC at time, now left and a judge.
David de Menezes - GCC, Head of Marketing

"Salami slicing" or splitting hairs.

MW is now criticising BC's questioning. Looks like he's getting annoyed.

Back at 2.05pm.

Judge is angsty about getting all 3 witnesses done today.

Top Knotch

Yes, he thinks AB talking honestly about the implications of the cotton ceiling workshop represented a breach of the BS.

MW QC (also Maya Sikand), at a chambers which purports to be engaged with human rights and concerned with protecting the vulnerable, are genuinely saying that they do not see or understand the difference between rape culture and individual rapes? Ye gods.

I felt sick how he called AB brining up the cotton ceiling as an example of rape culture being in breach and gross misconduct of bar standards.

Just disgusting.

What a vile man.

It seems there's a culture of misogyny in GCC - women aren't allowed to say 'no', even to something as obviously rape adjacent as 'the cotton ceiling', if they do they're wrong. There was also the aptly named WTF report

I'm wondering if this is partly why they didn't give Allison bigger cases. She was supposed to say 'yes' to the scraps they were handing her and took offence when she said 'no' as a black woman.

Jeeez.

Indeed, Mmm...the same MS who got rather cross with BC and said 'I am a woman, Mr Cooper'.

I'm just repeating this because..... wow.. just wow.

How CAN these people have such seeming conviction that they're right after this? Any woman should run a mile before she asks them to represent her.

Blimey, I only caught the last bits there but I need a break to calm down.

So coercion has a special definition that doesn't apply here.

No one else has done anything wrong but anything AB has done is definitely bad

Rape culture and rape are too confusing for fine legal brains to understand the difference and relationship between

Akin to coercion is not the same as coercion.

The world according to MW QC

Uncannily like something MS said about her report, IIRC.

I've said before but it's a crying shame there isn't a word-for-work transcript of that kind of witness testimony from the tribunal. Although MW must be relieved that there won't be one.

If there were to be such a transcript I don't think they'd be saying these things. They seem to live for plausible deniability.

I've said before but it's a crying shame there isn't a word-for-work transcript of that kind of witness testimony from the tribunal. Although MW must be relieved that there won't be one.

I think this every few seconds, or better yet video footage. Has to be seen to be believed.

When is rape culture not rape culture?
When is coercion not coercion?

I will leave you all to fill in the answers on those, I am sure you get my drift.

To me it looks like some within GCC have taken a group position on the meanings of (sexual) "coercion" and "rape culture" at odds with what they're widely believed to mean and they've done this to get an advantage in defending against a civil claim that will lose them money and/or virtue points.

It would be annoying enough to witness in other circumstances, but this is from people who seem to believe they exist on a higher moral plane than the rest of us.

Have a think about the kind of defendants you normally would have expected to hear this kind of thing from.

Who else is going to be on today? I am updating the persona non grata or whatever it's called for the next thread.

Are witnesses allowed to criticise the barrister’s questions?

Stephen Clark and then Liz Davies. Tom Wainwright tomorrow.

So maybe then DR on Wednesday, with leads to Thurs/Fri being the sensational end of season finale of Michelle Brewer.

Dramatis personae 😊

Thank you. Do you know if they are all Barristers at GCC?

So according to MW, a woman, a lesbian, is not allowed to discuss the detrimental effects of gender ideology on women/lesbians (eg cotton ceiling).
They don't want to HEAR about these things - yet for some reason think that women/lesbians should be happy to LIVE and EXPERIENCE these things.

Gutted I might miss Michelle Brewer. I'm doing a leadership and management course. Gah.

www.gardencourtchambers.co.uk/barristers/stephen-clark
www.gardencourtchambers.co.uk/barristers/liz-davies-qc/sao
www.gardencourtchambers.co.uk/barristers/tom-wainwright/sao

Can anyone who was watching explain what MW was trying to argue ("break it down for me" haha) - I'm only following on here and on TT and I'm really unclear on what MW was saying about rape culture (and TT isn't helping either).

Was he saying that because AB said that the cotton ceiling was rape culture, that was then in breach of Bar Council standards...because the cotton ceiling doesn't involve coercion? Or because rape culture doesn't involve coercion?