Prof Jo Phoenix vs The OU - Employment Tribunal Thread 5

[ickky]

Started on 2nd October at Watford Employment Tribunal (Radius House, 51 Clarendon Rd, Watford WD17 1HP 01923 281750)

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Header should read

URGENT CURRENT CASE - Public Access Request - J Phoenix - The Open University - 3322700/2021

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Abbreviations

JP - Jo Phoenix, Claimant (C)
OU - The Open University, Respondent (R)
J - Regional Employment Judge Young
P - Panel or panel member
BC - Ben Cooper KC, Counsel for C
JM - Jane Mulcahy KC, Counsel for R

OU Departments & Networks:

HWSRA - Health & Wellbeing Strategic Research Area
FASS - Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences
SPC - Dept of Social Policy & Criminology
KMi - Knowledge Media Institute
GCRN - Gender Critical Research Network

OU witnesses

PB - Dr Paraskevi Boukli, Former Senior Lecturer Criminology, Deputy Head SPC 2021-22
IF - Prof Ian Fribbance Dean of FASS
MW - Prof Marcia Wilson, Dean EDI, 2020-23
CM - Caragh Molloy, Group People Director 2019-23
LD - Dr Leigh Downes, Senior Lecturer in Criminology (in SPC), Academic Lead for EDI FASS 2019-21
PK - Peter Keogh, Professor Health & Society, Member RSSH
DD - Dr Deborah Drake, Senior Lecturer Criminology, Head of SPC 2018-21
CT - Catherine Tomlinson, Senior Student Advisor
LW - Louise Westmarland, Prof of Criminology, Co-Deputy Head SPC, 2018-21, Current Head SPC
JD - John Domingue, Prof of Computing Science, Director KMi, 2015-22
CW - Dr Christopher Williams, Senior Lecturer History
SD - Shaun Daley, Head OU’s Resourcing Hub. Head Strategic Resources, Co-Chair OU’s LGBT+ Staff Network
HBC - Helen Bowes-Catton, Lecturer Social Research Methods
NS - Nicola Snarey, Assoc Lecturer Eng Language
NatS - Natalie Starkey, Outreach & Public Engagement Officer Sch Physical Sciences, 2019-22
CT - Cath Tomlinson, Senior Student Advisor
SJ - Samantha Jacobson, Employee Relations Case Manager
RH - Richard Holliman, Prof Engaged Research, Head School Environment, Earth & Ecosystem Sciences, 2019-22. Member of Investigation Panel investigating the C’s grievance

Witness for JP:

SE - Sarah Earle, Professor Modern History Uni of Oxford, Founding member GCRN

Tribunal Tweets - https://twitter.com/tribunaltweets

TT coverage so far - tribunaltweets.substack.com/p/professor-jo-phoenix-v-the-open-university

Prof Jo Phoenix Witness Statement (scroll to bottom of page and download)

https://jophoenix.substack.com/p/phoenix-v-open-university?sd=pf

Thread 1 https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4905118-jo-phoenix-vs-the-ou-employment-tribunal-2nd-october-whispers-ben-cooper?page=1

Thread 2 https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4913946-prof-jo-phoenix-vs-the-ou-employment-tribunal-thread-2?page=1

Thread 3 https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4917480-prof-jo-phoenix-vs-the-ou-employment-tribunal-thread-3

Thread 4 https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4918479-prof-jo-phoenix-vs-the-ou-employment-tribunal-thread-4

Yes, I have no sound

Bravo Ben, you have the detail to hand

@nauticant Thanks for explaining how it works. But all the way up to Pro Vice Chancellor, eh? I suppose that could be seen as "look how seriosuly we took it" but maybe it looks like "incompetent to the very highest levels"

It's probably already been said - but there is masterful and then there is miraculous. (If my kids are anything to go by, anyway).

From the video, people are getting their coats

Back at 2

Obviously no q's from the J, or the Panel.

BC effectively saying to KS - you say in this statement that the sky is blue KS - yes. So that means you agree the sky is blue. KS - I disagree

That about sums up KS evidence today

Judge muted everyone, it didn't look like the panel had any q. for KS, break for lunch back at 2pm.

TT commentary

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1713863375493443860.html

Blimey!
I've randomly picked this up from The University of Nottingham Ethical Framework. An examply of how it works. So basically, in my view, it's a term in your contact of employment, even if you don't sign up to it as a document iyswim.

Penultimate paragraph

The Ethical Framework will be publicized within the University to staff and on the University of Nottingham website and drawn to the attention of new employees. Breaches of procedures which form part of the Ethical Framework may result in disciplinary action.

https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/governance/otherregulations/ethical-framework.aspx#:~:text=The%20Nolan%20Principles%20set%20out,%2C%20openness%2C%20honesty%20and%20leadership.

TT commentary from the first witness today.

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1713836528001003626.html

Thanks ickky and everyone keeping us up to date in real time. You are such stars and really appreciated by the rest of us.

Just thinking about who drafted the open letter. In my experience it’s done one of two ways, someone does a first draft (possibly after a discussion on the key points) and it is emailed to everyone for comment, some one redrafts to reflect comments and circulates etc. The other is that one person drafts and you stand round the pc and edit.

The first is most common and two is for urgent short responses. The likelihood that none of the witnesses were party to that was negligible, today CW outed himself.

Does this mean there is possibility email evidence on the OU servers of the drafting process (along with dodgy comments) that may not have been disclosed?

That's an interesting point Sisterpita. But I'm also thinking - has this not been picked up because at the end of the day it doesn't really matter which of the OU staff wrote it because all the witnesses agree it was done by OU staff, regardless of whether they can name them or not, and the impact on Jo would have been the same regardless of who wrote it because it was the signatories that was so public?

Or, do you think the emails from the drafting process are important as they may disclose intent on what the letter authors were trying to achieve? And because witnesses have said they signed in solidarity and not necessarily because they agreed with what it said? If so, there may be still draft versions of the document on the server with comments/tracked changes, which may be as useful as any emails.

The way it works is if JP's statement of claim referred to a failure on the part of the senior management, the OU would need to have a witness statement covering this because not to do so could mean the panel accepting JP's claim on that particular point. So once, because it's necessary, the senior OU person witness statement goes in, that person can be pulled into the hearing to give evidence.

Absolutely the pattern throughout.

The Pro VC's argument for the OU seems to be that as anyone could have joined the GCRN group, actions taken against the group/its members can't have beed discrimination or harassment on basis of their GC beliefs.

MyLady and Sisterpita, I only have a lowly role overseeing a small Charity, but even we bung any working draft of a bid/joint letter/document on Sharepoint and send doclinks or read/edit access to people who would like to have input.

For some document that I have potential to balls up, I do insist that the office manager protects them so I can't!

I suspect the IT guy would be able to tell you who did what, even if these very clever academics can't.

the answer is obviously 'yes' - yes they wanted to shut JP down but they don't want to admit that so they're self-identifying their answer as 'no'.

I.e. up is down, and we can trust nothing they say as they're liars - that's a fundamental core guiding principle of the ideology

There was a fascinating Humans of New York Facebook thread a couple of weeks ago, by someone who was a pro-democracy campaigner and member of the Iranian parliament before the revolution.

When Ayatollah Khomeini was beginning his takeover he made a lot of public promises about maintaining the parliament, upholding democracy, no reprisals etc. Of course as soon as he had power he started executing everybody, and freely admitted his previous promises had been lies.

You might think a religious leader would be a little wary about admitting lying - especially in that scale - but no. His argument was that Islam permitted lying, provided it was in the service of God. So he had not sinned.

I feel the same energy here. Righteous lies, told by the right side of history, are allowed - even encouraged - if they serve the Cause.

People might want to check they are still logged in as WFTCHTJ as it's possible they've been disconnected in the last while

From way back in thread 4 about copyright and The Elements Song, you might be interested in this statement by Tom Lehrer BinturongsSmellOfPopcorn:

https://tomlehrersongs.com/

I had a feeling he wasn't precious about them, but that's very generous indeed.

How amazing is that? What a lovely human being. Thanks nauticant

£226,810 raised by many fantastic gardening enthusiasts.

For all the horrible things we have heard said about Jo, I'm sure that she and all of us take great heart in looking at how many thousands of people are supporting her in all sorts of ways.

When I see that someone's managed to find an extra fiver or so, it really gives me a warm feeling about the inherent goodness still in this world. It all adds up, the small as well as the big.

So working on the assumption that OU lose what will be the ripple effect? As far as I can see most of the mob that turn up to harass and intimidate women at LWS, FiliA etc seem to be of a university age. They pride themselves on being so inclusive and right, I'm wondering what the fall out of being found to be discriminatory and wrong will be.

Oh, I see - I hadn't understood why he kept insisting on the fact that anyone could join the GCRN, unless to demonstrate (but why?) that he knew it wasn't objectionable in any way. Still, that argument won't fly, will it, lawyer types? This is what indirect discrimination is for in the EA, for example - if you have a group most of whose members are black, say, and you discriminate against everyone in the group, you don't get to claim that it isn't race discrimination on the grounds that there are a few white members.