NHS Fife tries to silence nurse - Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton - thread #17

[nauticant]

Sandie Peggie, a nurse at Victoria Hospital in Kirkcaldy (VH), has brought claims in the employment tribunal against her employer; Fife Health Board (the Board) and another employee, Dr B Upton. Ms Peggie’s claims are of sexual harassment, harassment related to a protected belief, indirect discrimination and victimisation. Dr Upton claims to be a transwoman, that is observed as male at birth but asserting a female gender identity.

The Employment Tribunal hearing started on Monday 3 February 2025 and was expected to continue for 2 weeks. However, it is going to overrun and there will be an adjournment with the hearing resuming in July (current best estimate). The hearing commenced with Sandie Peggie giving evidence. Dr Beth Upton gave evidence from Thursday 6 February to Wednesday 12 February.

Access to view the hearing remotely was obtainable by sending an email request to [email protected] headed Public Access Request (Peggie v Fife Health Board) 4104864/2024 and requesting access.

However, as a result of problems with the livestreaming, apparently caused by a very large number of observers, remote public access to the hearing was suspended on Tuesday 11 February. It was suggested that it might be reinstated at some point but don't count on it.

The hearing is being live tweeted by https://x.com/tribunaltweets and there's additional information here: https://tribunaltweets.substack.com/p/peggie-vs-fife-health-board-and-dr. This also has threadreaderapp archives of live-tweeting of the sessions of the hearing for those who can't follow on Twitter, for example: archive.is/xkSxy.

An alternative to Twitter is to use Nitter: https://nitter.poast.org/tribunaltweets

Thread 1: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5186317-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse
Thread 2: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5267591-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-thread-2
Thread 3: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5268347-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-3
Thread 4: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5268942-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-4
Thread 5: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5269149-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-5
Thread 6: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5269635-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-6
Thread 7: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5270365-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-7
Thread 8: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5271511-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-8
Thread 9: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5271596-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-9
Thread 10: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5271723-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-10
Thread 11: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5272046-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-11
Thread 12: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5272276-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-12
Thread 13: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5272398-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-13
Thread 14: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5272939-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-14
Thread 15: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5273119-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-15
Thread 16: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5273636-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-16

Ahem - thanks for the reminder - back to the casting call.... suggestions please!

Dr Upton - David Tennant, Karla Sofia Gascon, Dana International

Sandie Peggie (or other NHS staff yet to be introduced): Sharon Small, Anne Marie Duff, Ashley Jensen, Claire Grogan, Sarah Lancashire, Laura Main, Siobhan Redmond, Daniela Nardini

Pete the Plumber - Brian Blessed (although he is neither bald nor burly)

Naomi Cunningham - Maxine Peake, Glenn Close, Meryl Streep, Fiona Shaw, Kate Winslet? Suranne Jones…

Jane Russell - Imelda Staunton, Frances Barber,

Esther -

Judge - Charles Dance

Any others?
Jodie Foster?
Saoirse Ronan?
Lupita Nyong'o?

Yep. We'll never know how far we'd have got as a society if there had been sanity and genuine compromise. If Stonewall hadn't needed a new cause and gone full no compromise, no debate and let the Beaumont boys (and girl) run the show.

Acknowledge that people who look and behave differently to "the norm" face discrimination and can have a shit time of things, and that's not right and it should be unacceptable.

If someone wants to do man gender or woman gender or non-binary gender then have at it. You shouldn't be treated less favourably than someone not doing that (nor more favourably - eg dress codes exist).

Acknowledge that sex is immutable and sex based rights need to exist and be enforced for reasons of privacy, dignity and safety. That is the boundary.

Have an adult conversation around language, preferred language vs compelled speech and recognise the issues on both sides and that both sides need to agree to compromise, not just one getting to roll completely over the other.

Well despite stating again and again "I am a woman" unfortunately DU didn't produced any evidence to support that claim and to overturn what has been stated by NC - biologically and legally a man based on previous legal cases. It would be very surprising if the J came to any different conclusion - but that is going to have to be the first thing on the list to "determine" because all the other claims are based on that...

I think it would work better as an amendment to the EA, to protect the right to "gender expression" instead of reassignment. While repealing the GRA at the same time.

This would be a reasonable middle ground where rights around single-sex spaces and particularly those for women and girls are strengthened and protected, but people with gender identity beliefs are also safe from discrimination, in employment and so on, for expressing them through their own speech (and not compelling others) or presentation or cosmetic surgeries or whatever they like.

I noted this passage from the TT

NC - it's uncomfortable, it's hard to say, but because a man wears clothes, grows hair etc it doesn't make him a woman. It's a fact
JR - object, false premise it's a fact. it's her belief.
J - qu of case is facts and law. Might be a necessary fact, what is sex of R2

Advertised as gritty northern drama.

Really there needs to be a widespread campaign by men for men about expanding the bandwidth of being male. So people could be happy wearing what they want, feel OK in male spaces, and not decide they want to invade ours. This isn't a problem created by women, and yet we seem to be the only ones having to deal with the consequences.

and it is a fact of course. All this belief stuff is nonsense.

That's the problem with being "nice" - it is not actually kind.

I've long argued it's not nice or kind to tell someone they have done something that is impossible e.g. change sex. However much they want to, whatever steps they take, they cannot change sex and there will always be events or circumstances that confirm that they have not, be that the a cross middle-aged Scottish nurse asking them to leave the CR, or biology denying them the ability to reproduce as the opposite sex. Perhaps if DrU had heard "sorry love you can wear what you want and use whatever name you choose but you can never become a woman and however many people politely play along with your fiction the vast majority of people will read you as male even if you have lipstick on" right at the beginning of transitioning they wouldn't have reached the point where they stand before judge, under oath and declare that they aren't male, aren't a man, are a woman, are a biological female.
Pandering to the lie isn't kind it's actually cruel.

Being conciliatory to this coercive nonsense has already got us into a fine old mess.

Court scene. Upton has taken his seat.

J: Good morning Dr.Upton, could you please confirm your name and-

JR: OBJECTION!!!

Can I suggest Alison Steadman to play JR, please, then she can do her Candice-Marie voice from 'Nuts in May'?

It is important to the case to find out what the people in the department thought. Because if they all went on oath and said DU was a biological woman - highly unlikely - then the case would have suffered a big blow.

But the point was presumably to show that none of the staff members would agree that DU was a "literal" woman - and I expect she will ask all the witnesses about this:

TT yesterday PM part 2:
NC: 3 possibilities I think

1. Nobody else had any concerns
2. Some ppl did but didn't want to hurt your feelings.
3. Ppl did have concerns but too frightened to express them.

Christopher Eccleston as the husband, especially sweet with Tennant as Upton. I'll love Daniel Radcliffe as Upton.

Rupert Grint or one of the Weasley twins for Upton?

Upton is a bit of a hero in a way. He's peaking the nation in a way we haven't really seen before from a tribunal. He's in the champions league place just behind Bryson.

I'll love Daniel Radcliffe as Upton.

Isn't he one who has a) come out as gay and b) believes the TWAW nonsense and has been harshly critical of JKR? Without acting in the films based on her works he would not have come to prominence so early.

Who has a husband?
DU married (not a civil partnership) a woman in 2021 a year before coming out as a trans woman

Someone posted about a nurse they had worked with as a man who left and then came back some while later in a new post as a woman. Then went off on parental leave after getting his female partner pregnant.

Brain. Scrambled. Yes.

@SelfPortraitWithHagstone · Today 15:55

"... When I am in charge of a public department I am going to have a poster above every computer saying WOULD YOU STAND BY THIS IN COURT?"

Quite. I worked in the NHS for over 25 years and the motto of the director I reported to was: "Would I be able to justify this if I were hauled up in front of a Parliamentary committee to answer questions?"

genius!

Another rule I was taught was don't commit to print something you couldn't say to the person's face.

I’m not sure if we can post pictures again but one image that stayed in my mind was early pictures of Brian Eno, in his Roxy Music days, when reading all the coverage.
Does anyone else see the resemblance?

Yeah, transactivation will try to leverage that Maya Forstater ruling, any which way they can. It's a legally protected belief. And they're going to try and pretend that that means it's not necessarily factual.

Unfortunately for them they're coming up against a judge who doesn't speak their lingo.

I think Nicholas Hoult in a bad wig would make a good Upton.

🤣🤣🤣