NHS Fife tries to silence nurse - Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton - thread #19

[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, after 2 weeks it was not complete and it adjourned part-heard. It seems that it will resume on 16 July and the last day of evidence will be 28 July but it wasn't completely clear whether it might end a day or two later.

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
Thread 17: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5273827-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-17
Thread 18: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5274332-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-18

Are they a subgroup, though? How do we know? I'm personally very uncomfortable with the idea that we can remove that motive from some men who pretend to be women. Some of them openly admit the motive is sexual. Some of them say it isn't but then display behaviours that suggest otherwise. And no-one is a sex offender until they commit a sexual offence and get caught.

It strikes me that so much of this "deadnaming" and right to privacy about trans status etc relies very much on the assumption that the person is completely unrecognisable as their actual sex so it can be a complete secret and anyone who disagrees with them being fully accepted does so only out of transphobia and not because their actual sex is obvious. Which just isn't the case most of the time. Certainly not where the person has not undergone any medical transition.

It's one of the things I found bizarre in the ERCC case - did the "non-binary" staff member think no one could see they were female?

Brilliant 👏👏👏👏👏

It's a hard conversation to have, especially if you are autistic. But just because it's difficult and is going to raise some uncomfortable points we shouldn't avoid it. Otherwise we let down and fail autistic people. Everyone deserves better than avoidance of problems because it only leads to more problems further down the line.

I’m quite willing to (hypothetically) believe that there’s some “biological” or developmental cause for a certain type of gender dysphoria, that seen in very young boys and is persistent through later life. This seems to be the condition that originally interested doctors, and follows a well defined pattern.
Whether affirmation, hormonal treatments and surgery is an appropriate treatment for this is another matter. And whether it follows that men can become women, males become females, and that this should be enshrined in law, is a monstrous overreach, significantly detrimental to females in general and undermining of scientific fact and common sense.

Yes, definitely.

My brothers partner is a TiF, who has had a lot of sexual related trauma. Trauma that wouldn't have happened if they were male.

She frequently questions her gender identity as irrespective of what she chooses to dress like or call herself or use pronouns the truth is that transitioning hasn't cured her disdain for her own body being female. That said she also has a dissonance that the trauma she has had may contribute to the way that she feels, and after socially transitioning at university among her peers, is finding it hard to resolve herself now she's created a circle of captured friends which act as a very persuasive echo chamber.

It's really quite sad to see from an outside perspective because no external support surrounding sexual trauma is permitted to be accepted or tried and the only acceptable method is transitioning.

Absolutely. If Upton had a GRC it would complicate this case. As he doesn't, he had no right to be in a women's changing room and the hospital should not have supported his (non-existent) right to be there.

When the 'truth' is based entirely on your own personal feelings then it doesn't matter. Everyone is supposed to be, or willing to be, subservient to an individual's own self definition. It is a nebulous, imaginary world in which you have to be forever anxious of transgression, thought crime or 'micro-aggression'.

Yes. It's another lie we're expected to tell ourselves.

I absolutely get that one set of rules for people who "pass" and another for those who don't is unworkable in any sort of legislation but all the more reasons not to make laws based on something that's as completely unquantifiable and unverifiable as gender.

Gosh you’ve just made me think of the social model of disability - we are not disabled by the inherent condition but by the poor fit with our environment. Eg if most people were in wheelchairs then all furniture were designed for a lower height - which would be disabling for the able bodied etc.

This concept has led to lots of improvements in accessibility but change has been very slow. But maybe it’s taken hold in the public consciousness more than I thought - and that’s why trans issues may seem like a “logical” extension of that thinking? Also another reason for me to be annoyed about these ideas being hijacked for the benefit of advantaged able bodied males. 😠

AIUI, KS's email to colleagues was not initially disclosed as part of the discovery process. Given that it's clearly very relevant to the case, this argues either deliberate suppression of evidence or stratospheric levels of incompetence. It's been described as "intemperate" which I assume means NC has now seen it and considers it serious and material enough to propose adding KS as R3.

I agree. The factors that underpin trans identities, and gender distress where it co-exists with a trans identity, should not be conflated with decisions about how to include people with trans identities in SSS.

I think lots of people bring the concept of 'deservingness' into the mix. I feel it shouldn't factor at all.

It is well established that lots of young, nascently gay children develop dysphoria and significant anxiety around sex based roles and expectations. We may as well ask if being sex sex attracted is biological..

My own personal theory is that personal identification/orientation is psychological and formed very early on within the matrix of the maternal/familial/social psyche.Mothers who long for a child that is opposite to the actual sex of the child, for example.

This is a theory I've heard and I support the idea. IMO body dysmorphia and anorexia have some stark similarities:
*A refusal to accept your own body as 'correct'.
*A need to change that body, even to its own severe detriment.
*Denial of reality.
*A need to control the narrative.
*An obsession. Food with anorexia, being validated for Gen. Dys.

Unfortunately I have personal family experience of anorexia and it's insidious cousin, OCD and I have seen what an all consuming, horrible mental illness it is. I honestly think Gen Dys. is similar and should be treated as such and these people helped and supported, not encouraged to continue with their delusion.

I also believe people like Katy price who have excessive cosmetic surgery have some kind of similar mental illness.

I have sympathy for anyone who has gender dysphoria because it must be horrible to have such a debilitating mental illness but the solution shouldn't be to let them crack on with chopping off healthy body parts anymore that encouraging someone with anorexia yo starve themselves.

Of course I also believe only a very small percentage of trans women have gen. dysphoria and that's a whole different issue in itself.

The idea of deserving is particularly British culture even when we have historically progressive on social issues.

Victorian ideals which were propagated by the middle classes very much had these ideas of mortality tied to them.

We haven't really moved much on from them.

@KnottyAuty - yes, the social model of disability is often at play. The medical model is widely denounced as a tool of oppression. Currently, a biopsychosocial model is widely accepted - suggesting multiple factors interrelate with each other.

I think causation is important in relation to treatment/addressing distress, but I don't think it has relevance to how society should navigate the issues arising.

@RedToothBrush, I agree about the issue of deservingness.

What I find interesting about the Fife case is that the NHS operates on principles of equal treatment. Access to treatment is not determined by whether you are a saint or a sinner in anyone's eyes. However, Fife seem to think that access to SS CRs can be determined in this way.

This sounds similar to what an ex nursing colleague once told me years ago. She had worked with gender reassignment patients and when I mentioned I thought they just had surgery, recovered and then merrily lived their new life she assured me that no. The surgery is never ending because it's not enough/often results in complications and apart from that the lifelong mental health problems were huge.

It is well established that lots of young, nascently gay children develop dysphoria and significant anxiety around sex based roles and expectations. We may as well ask if being sex sex attracted is biological

I’m sure that’s true, a much more likely explanation, and we can ask anything we like.

But we shouldn’t rule things out because alternative explanations exist. It may be that different things are true for different people. In the same way, I can hypothetically accept that a sense of “gender” exists that is innate. I also suspect that some “gendered” behaviours are biologically (for want of a better term) based, rather than being entirely socially constructed.

But even if I believe these things, it doesn’t follow that men can become women or that affirmation etc. is the logical, moral or practical consequence of my (hypothetical) belief.

Oh dear god the performative lovelies on the Sali Hughes facebook are at it again. 'My son has said he's trans and I feel terrible that I didn't realise he was actually a girl earlier. How can I make it up to her?' Cue rainbow and kindness meltdown and praise for being the best mum ever. One polite comment recommending looking at the Cass review regarding transition was immediately locked by admins.

Women are capable of the most depressing groupthink if it earns them likes and lovehearts.

Be kind is fucking poison.

100%
The sooner this convo is mainstream the better.

I hate the idea of the disorder part of the diagnosis Autism Spectrum Disorder. I prefer Condition.

But it’s cases like this where I think yup, maybe I need to get over that. Some presentations really need to be called for what they are.

You could argue though that a new trans name is more akin to the adoption process, where deadnaming someone is definitely an issue.

Sorry that was a derail. Just venting.

Can I ask a question of @prh47bridge and any other legal people about KS's way forward ?

It seems to me that an option for her would be to back away from her email saying that Dr U lied/exaggerated and that she sent the email in haste.

Presumably, this isn't an option if she is a co-respondent with Fife, but could she appoint her own representatives and say she was misled by Fife's policies and Dr U??

Oh careful - let’s not go down the refrigerator mother route… I hear what you’re saying tho