NHS Fife tries to silence nurse - Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton - thread #20

[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 last 2 weeks. However, after 2 weeks it was not complete and it adjourned part-heard. It is planned that it will resume on 16 July and the last day of evidence will be 28 July and then there will be 2 days of submissions from counsel meaning that the hearing will end on 30 July.

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
Thread 19: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5274571-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-19

Thank you, I’ll do some gardening.

Carol Potter! You need to get a grip on this situation.

PS - look for a new job as you have made a shit show of this one

NHS pension technicality that those outside nursing may not be aware of. Given her joining date and role, it's likely that SP has special class status - this allows her to take her full pension at age 55. To do this you have to be in a qualifying NHS role on your 55th birthday. Otherwise the pension age reverts to 60.

If she's dismissed, and not able to get (or can't face) a new NHS nursing job elsewhere, she will lose not just her salary but also 5 years of pension payments.

NC in cross examination has already undermined the credibility of what DU has said & done, which is the basis of the evidence presumably being relied upon in the report & its conclusions. She's actually tested the veracity of his evidence - something that NHS Fife don't appear to have done a great job of. She's been able to extract confirmation SP didn't name Bryson in the exchange & got DU to roll back on how significant or serious the alleged patient safety incidents were. If the disciplinary goes ahead based on shaky evidence & ends up concluding she's guilty of bullying & harassment & a risk to patient safety, she's got massive grounds to challenge the report & its conclusions, and any subsequent guilty outcome. But for them to proceed after what NC has uncovered, it smacks of petty vindictive conduct.

NHS Fife have painted themselves into a corner - they've got a report that concludes she's guilty of what she's been accused of, and want to push ahead with the recommendations (so it retrofits with the claims made in court). All while the ET has already undermined that evidence, suggesting the report is based on allegedly flawed/exaggerated/biased/false information.

I think i mentioned a few threads back that there's echos of the Salmond case where Scotgov investigated allegations against him & produced a report that the court deemed to have been 'tainted by bias'. That was the case Roddy Dunlop KC was counsel for Scotgov, who was professionally embarrassed by them telling him they'd fully complied with disclosure, only for Roddy to have to apologise to the court for the previous assurances given as Scotgov were still holding out on relevant documents. The behaviour of Scotgov throughout that whole case was so egregious, the court awarded almost full costs in Salmond's favour , almost unheard of. It was £600k on Salmond's costs. NHS is knowingly risking a similar outcome if they proceed with this.

This is just mental.

Utter bastards if they screw up her pension.

Hopefully she will get sufficient compensation to make up for the 5 years as NHS Fife have deliberately make her position untenable.

Peggy and the mean girls gang in Fife should hang their heads in shame. They have also made female managers look incompetent and so makes it harder for the rest of us.

Peggy & the mean girls have refused to say how much money they are spending on legal fees !

What is Wes doing?

The tribunal proceeding should have finished last Friday, but it would have been weeks or months before the judgment was published, so they are still jumping the gun in a mindboggling fashion.

Wes is feeling immensely relieved that this is happening in Scotland.

Wes is mopping his brow and hoping he can turn the Titanic around before the Darlington nurses happen.

This is going to be a textbook case in how not to do stuff.

NHS Fife is going to be a case study on loads of HR and legal training courses in the near future.

In case people haven't seen this:

https://x.com/totaltitter/status/1891237303365865849?s=61

Do we know how old she is and when she will turn 55? Was it in her evidence? I missed the first couple of days.

If she turns 55 in, say, a couple of weeks, is Fife trying to turn the screw on her to settle the ET in the next few days by unpausing the disciplinary process and introducing the threat of being dismissed this Friday and thus losing her pension?

A sort of 'nice pension you've got there, shame if anything happened to it. Settle your ET claim, we'll keep you employed on your birthday as part of the deal, we don't have to disclose any more very embarrassing stuff and you can walk away with some compensation, a mealy mouthed apology and your full pension.

Although how this works with R2 as a respondent I don't know.

It's late and my brain is struggling.

I'm getting page doesn't exist. What did it say?

Pluvia has recommended this Tanya de Grunwald's podcast (This isn't working) which has 3 episodes on DEI episodes 6-8:

I would strongly recommend that NHS Fife screen these for everyone concerned with this matter.

This is so insane. I thought it must be that they want to formally end their investigation, and so the wording was prescribed, but actually isn’t “ misgendering” a new charge? Burn the Witch!

@CriticalCondition I read that Peggie is 50.

Roll on Friday discussion-in-passing in response to Telegraph piece:

What I personally would guess on what you’ve just posted is that Fife’s lawyers have realised if she’s not an employee the Tribunal has no power to make recommendations if she wins in July (ie to change policy following a finding it is unlawful) and so have assessed sacking her now is better than letting her win. It will be expensive, and be paid for by us as taxpayers, but they think it’s the best way of protecting their reputation and remaining committed to The Right Side Of History.

It also explains the otherwise baffling refusal to disclose documents expressly ordered for disclosure by the Tribunal, when you realise they do actually really think getting the hearing to go part-heard was all they needed for

I hope they’ve misjudged this, because the law on ordering recommendations relating to successful claims of discrimination from former employees is not settled law by any means. I think if an ET thinks Fife have done what I allege they’ll find for Peggie and make Fife take it to the EAT.

It’s a very high-stakes gamble, given the allegations appear to relate to a very long time ago. Hard to see how it isn’t going to be nailed on unlawful discriminatory dismissal and victimisation. Trouble is even with final salary pension costs the Trust are happy to spend our money continuing unlawful policies.

https://www.rollonfriday.com/discussion/worst-possible-legal-specialism

Oh well, that doesn't explain the madness then. Just trying to make sense of it.

Well, well. I think that's a very plausible explanation and fits with everything Fife have done.

I do wander over to RoF on occasion as one or two posters there have long been following this stuff and know their GC onions inside out. There was a bit of comment when the tribunal kicked off but it petered out. Good to see it being discussed again.

A question for any HR/legal bods - does Maya F's precedent re protected belief apply in Scotland? I only ask as I know laws may only apply to England & Wales and don't know if ET ruling apply throughout GB, or don't apply to Scotland.

Also, is it legal to continue disciplinary hearings during an ET? I would've thought they should be either completed beforehand or paused during, due to the risk of prejudice to either side.

If it wasn’t already crystal clear from the ET, NHS Fife are behaving in an extremely prejudicial way (and have from the start of their first Ix). Despicable.

This is a clever read of potential strategy that would make sense of otherwise inexplicable behaviour yet we’ve seen no evidence that there is anyone at Fife who is remotely strategically clever. I wonder if it is more likely to be incompetence? In my own institution, many years ago, redundancy letters were triggered in error automatically at the end of a pre-loaded date range for a post — even though subsequently the post hadn’t been closed at the end of that period. In a stab at looking like they’d followed procedure in the lead up to the IX could this have pre-loaded and the letter triggered without anyone clocking it was set to do so? It would seem unlikely given that schedules would need to be checked but possible?

Mind you - there is also arrogance coming off the internal legal team given the failures to disclose. Could it be that they are trying to create some sort of conflict of interest that would make it difficult for KS to become R3?

Yes, it's a warning. But they may have misjudged it. National feeling is building up to serious outrage. It's another Bryson moment.

There will be women empowered by the increasing support whose fury will no longer be contained by threats.

Courage calls and all that

Yes. A precedent set in the EAT is binding on tribunals across the UK.

I have woken up so cross I had to do some gardening for Sarah Holman, Harassed and Victimised for supporting Women’s Rights. Remembering to reduce CrowdJustice's slightly egregious 'tip'.

Well now. What’s excitement will today have to offer, I wonder?!

I’m going to cook the biggest pan of popcorn just in case. That should help keep the famalam fed, while I juggle work and MN.