Allison Bailey v Stonewall - Employment Tribunal hearing Thread 16

[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

Thread 10 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4553754-allison-bailey-v-stonewall-employment-tribunal-hearing-thread-10

Thread 11 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4555145-allison-bailey-v-stonewall-employment-tribunal-hearing-thread-11

Thread 12 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4555687-allison-bailey-v-stonewall-employment-tribunal-hearing-thread-12

Thread 13 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4556235-allison-bailey-v-stonewall-employment-tribunal-hearing-thread-13

Thread 14 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4556407-allison-bailey-v-stonewall-employment-tribunal-hearing-thread-14

Thread 15 www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4556803-allison-bailey-v-stonewall-employment-tribunal-hearing-thread-15

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)
David Renton - barrister at GCC (20 May, 25 May)
Marc Willers - Barrister at GCC (23 May)
Stephen Clark - Barrister at GCC (23 May)
Liz Davies - Barrister at GCC (23 May)
Cathryn McGahey - Bar Council Ethics Committee's VC (24 May)
Tom Wainwright - Barrister at GCC (24 May)
Colin Cook - Head clerk at GCC (24 May)
David de Menezes - GCC, Head of Marketing (25 May)
Kathryn Cronin - barrister at GCC (25 May)
Michelle Brewer - barrister at GCC at time, now left and a judge (26 May)
Stephanie Harrison - joint head of chambers (26 May)

To Come

Closing arguments for AB, GCC, and SW (20 June)

ESV, my DH and I announce proudly to each other on a near-daily basis over dinner that we have the “lucky cat hair”! 😂

In a sense, Stonewall joining in with the "T" was an admission of defeat

This is a really important point. You've got two organisations, Stonewall and Gendered Intelligence.

One set up as a campaigning LGB org, one set up as a campaigning T org, and both now well-funded with lots of staff earning good money, raking it in from government, and big organisations with DEI-crazy HR departments.

Now, given that their causes conflict in an utterly fundamental way, but in a way that's too subtle for many to grasp at first, what do you do?

Do you start having those arguments? Does Stonewall decide to stand up for LGB against the T, and create an ideological battle which would harm each of the organisations' PR fluff as being a "safe pair of corporate hands" symbolising "civil rights", "equality" etc, that you just pay a DEI tithe to? Do you go back to campaigning rather than corporate consultancy?

Of course not - if you're boss of Stonewall you just come to a quiet agreement with GI that "okay, we won't tread on your toes, we'll align our output so we can both keep our heads in the trough". And you kid yourself that it doesn't really matter, and it's not really betraying anyone - it's all just a bunch of theoretical word-salad anyway right? "Same-sex attracted / same-gender attracted? Whatever..."

Of course you appease the trans rights crowd for a quiet life.

Cheers big ears @Birdsweepsin!

That's excellent. 👍
Thank you very much.

Re the TransJustice Conference hosted by GCC in 2016, which Allison cites in her statement….MB was one of the speakers. So was Jay Stewart of Gendered Intelligence. It was reported in the publication MB cited in the tribunal, Gay Star News, who said MB:

detailed a Court of Appeal Case when judges regarded non-disclosure of gender history as lying. The Crown Prosecution Service in England and Wales has said it will not automatically prosecute a trans person where sex by deception is alleged. They will treat cases on their ‘merits’, leaving the option to prosecute open.
The lawyers concluded the law is unclear and could be used against trans people – and that they should know the risk.

GSN also quoted another of the speakers, Grietje Baars, as saying ‘judges have twisted the law to fit personal prejudice. There is much contradiction in their rulings’.

Which is one to ponder, looking back on this week’s events.

No way are Bahlsen good.
Does anyone who visits coffee shops still get those tiny amaretti? Biscuits?

I love them but ain't seen one in the wild for some time, mainly because coffee even decaf gives me migraines.
Wanders off wondering how to spell those tiny biscuits, and if you can buy sacks small packets of them.
But not before using the gavel on Bahlsen

I am enduring Day 3 of a terrible flare-up of gut disease so all this talk of biscuits and cakes is driving me mad. I am back on a very restrictive diet alongside the Adalimumab injections. FUCK.

Think of me while you're all stuffing your fucking faces. <stares mournfully at plain white rice for later> Oh, and the fence panels are still in the back garden exactly where I dumped them on Thursday.

OTOH being able to discuss Gendered Intelligence and Stonewall is a brilliant distraction. I'd love to know exactly when Judge Michelle Brewer got involved, and how.

Terfydactyl you’re a woman after my own heart. Amaretti are the business. Waitrose do them, I happen to know whistles innocently Amaretti

They’re very easy to make, if you’re so inclined.

I don't like Jaffa cakes

That is a great article. I was so pleased reading it, I bit into my support Magnum without due care and attention and lots of little shards of chocolate have gone all over my pyjamas and bed. I and by I, I mean the cat will be picking licking them up all day.

Love the biscuit chat! Raspberry puffs from M and S are my favourite atm. Bahlsen do a dupe but they are inferior IMO (surely that is an AIBU thread all on its own).

An excellent read, and the reputational damage to GC(C) and Stonewall spelled out very clearly. Nice that Kirren Medcalf's support dog got a mention ;o)

I always thought that transgender was a type of body dysmorphia, is this not the case anymore? If not, when did that change? (being careful with my words as god knows I dont wish to offend anyone or get ticked off.)

I also didn't realise that Gendered Intelligence had been around since 2008.

Is that related to another event? The date rings a bell. Stephen Whittle and WPATH?

Waitrose definitely do amaretto biscuits, in one of those biscuit bags if you need a search image. I was in there yesterday for....reasons. Big sprog actually picked one up but decided not to get them.

@SpindleSheWrote

Think of me while you're all stuffing your fucking faces

If it's any consolation, I am waiting for my fences to be replaced, so I had to buy a big bag of lovely biscuits for the workers to keep them happy. Then they delayed the start date and I have had a whole bag of biscuits whispering sweet nothings at me from the cupboard for over a month.

I have resisted their siren call as I have no self control and once I start, I cannot stop.

My appetite identifies as a skinny person, unfortunately my metabolism knows I am a fatten.

Hope you feel better soon.

Thanks, @ickky. I didn't realise the fence:biscuit frustration interface was so common. Must be a feminist thing.

😂😂😂

BURN THE WITCH!!!!!

On the cat hair front....

My cat as well as being bloody gorgeous has very long hair. He refuses to take my advice about not crawling under the bush where the sticky balls grow (can you tell I'm not a gardener - talking of which Sarah - gardening just looked she's still got a way to go today and could probably do with some extra hard digging).

Back to the cat so he gets covered in sticky balls and then refuses to let me help him remove them. Eventually it gets into a big enough clump that I can start doing little snips with the ✂ whenever he's not paying attention.

Last summer he'd amassed the most glorious large lump of cat hair that finally came away from the cat.

Yes I know I should have thrown it away, but he's getting old, and it was a lot of hair...a strokable amount even! So I did what any slightly strange cat owning woman of a certain age might do. I kept it.

Every now and again I have reason to go into the location which said clump is currently stored.

Every single flipping time it scares the shit out of me because I mistake it for a rat!I

Can you recommend a recipe?

😂😂😂

Last summer he'd amassed the most glorious large lump of cat hair that finally came away from the cat.

Yes I know I should have thrown it away, but he's getting old, and it was a lot of hair...a strokable amount even! So I did what any slightly strange cat owning woman of a certain age might do. I kept it.

If you find yourself in London, I recommend a trip to Tate Britain for the Cornelia Parker exhibition. It's outstanding but I mention it because she has a huge ball of string as an exhibit (very good story behind it). And there's an exploded shed (with a story behind it that most of us would recognise). I, too, want to work with the military to blow up my shed for me and then have all those delightful trainees combing the field to pick up the debris for me so that I can construct an artwork.

www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-britain/cornelia-parker

Cornelia Parker's blown up shed is my fav ever piece of modern art. I'm looking forward to seeing it again.

Just had a look at the clip, that is stunning, for all the mess its surprisingly calm! Oh to be well enough to see it in person!

That Times article was glorious.

It must be shit for anyone working at GCC now. My heart bleeds

I'm afraid that, as I have been running the Low Carb Bootcamp here for 10 years now, I can only join in the enjoyment of biscuits at a vicarious level.

With you on the Bahlson. They're so....meh.

I don't like the wee hard amaretti (those fuckers will break your teeth - same as biscotti which are only edible if you soak them in coffee) but soft amaretti are lovely - www.sainsburys.co.uk/gol-ui/product/coffee-shop/sainsburys-soft-amaretti--taste-the-difference-180g