NHS Fife tries to silence nurse - Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton - thread #23

[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
Thread 20: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5275782-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-20
Thread 21: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5276925-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-21
Thread 22: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5280174-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-22

Witnesses so far:

Monday, 3 February 2025
Sandie Peggie

Tuesday, 4 February 2025
Sandie Peggie

Wedneday, 5 February 2025
Sandie Peggie
Maya Forstater
Mr Peggie
Nicole Peggie

Thursday, 6 February 2025
a row about disclosure particularly over BMA documents
Sheila Bell (Sandie Peggie's mum)

Friday, 7 February 2025
very late start, massive row over disclosure, agreed that Beth Upton would start giving evidence on Monday

Monday 10 February 2025
Beth Upton

Tuesday 11 February 2025
Beth Upton
collapse of public access

Wednesday 12 February 2025
Beth Upton

Thursday 13 February 2025
Esther Davidson

Friday 14 February 2025
Esther Davidson

For anyone following Tribunal Tweets, this is their list of the abbreviations used:

C/SP - Claimant, Sandy Peggie
NC - Naomi Cunningham, C’s barrister
MG - Margaret Gribbons, C’s solicitor
R1/Board - first respondent, Fife Health Board
R2/DU - second respondent, Dr B Upton
JR - Jane Russell, KC, barrister for Rs
AW - Adam Watson, solicitor for Rs
J - Employment Judge Alexander Kemp
ET - Employment Tribunal
P1, P2 - additional panel members
CR - changing room
AE - Accident & emergency department
B&H - bullying and harassment
SocMed - social media
SM - Sex Matters
HR - Human Rights
TW - Transwoman
HI - hate incident
PCP - provision, criteria or practice is a rule/policy/ practice that can put ppl at a disadvantage based on certain characteristics. The term is used in employment law to assess whether an employers actions create different outcomes for employees based on their characteristics.
KS - Kate Searle, DU's supervisor and A&E consultant
ED - Esther Davidson, SP’s line manager
SF - Stuart Fraser, SP’s RCN Rep
AG - Angela Glancy, headed up SP's investigation
IX - investigation
CX or FC - (formal) complaint
DX - disciplinary
FtP - fitness to practice

As ever, a request:

We've seen what a nightmare this has been for Sandie, and what a gruelling and uncertain experience it is to go through an Employment Tribunal. It would be even harder going through it and worrying about how to fund it.

Other women are going through similar experiences and need our support, so at least they're able to focus on the important parts and not worry all the time about funding. One woman going through this is Sarah Holman who is crowdfunding under Harassed and Victimised for supporting Women’s Rights. She's on Mumsnet as @sartay.

Wow another thread! Thank you @nauticant looking forward to what more shenanigans are going to unfold on this thread.

This has certainly been an eye opening tribunal!

Thanks @nauticant .

Thanks so much @nauticant. You are there for every thread. Anyone want to guess what number thread we will be at by the time it starts again in July?

I guess 43.

Thanks, I’m looking forward to seeing the reaction to @Chrysanthemum5’s letter.

Thanks nauticant. You are an absolute star.
I'm mostly lurking, but following closely.

Me too 😂

Thanks @nauticant

@Cismyfatarse I have previously claimed 54 (currently sticking to this!)

Thank you for these threads.

Thanks for the new thread.

I'm sticking with 25 @Cismyfatarse but really anything could happen by then so 43 might not be far off!

Can Sandie be pulled back as a witness or is
she now free to read about the case - or comment on here?

Checking in from the last thread and my last post on there which is :

It just all boils down to the GRC ultimately. No male should be able to legally be a woman.
What a man chooses to wear and his preferences with regards to his 'gender identity' should be irrelevant to women's sex based provision (which should equally have nothing to do with gender).
So It should be possible to protect women's sex based rights without infringing on a male persons belief that they are woman gender.
100% what has gone wrong is the conflation of sex and gender in law.
That is what we are seeing played out time and time again.
Take the GRC away and I think most of this will fall off.

Thanks @nauticant , another thread & more to discuss. I don't think we'll ever struggle to find something to talk about with this case.

I responded to @lifeturnsonadime 's post right at the end of the last thread, so I'll repost it here:

Take the GRC away and I think most of this will fall off.

I couldn't agree more, but realistically, I think we are a million miles away from that happening. It would be such a sea-change, and, as I've remarked before, the international aspect doesn't help. Many countries now have similar legislation (some, it seems, much worse than the UK).

I don't dispute that but I think that that should be the bottom line/ aim.

Conceding the GRC is the ultimately the death knell of sex based rights.

Placemarking on shiny new thread! thankyou @nauticant

I hope so too, @lifeturnsonadime . That once the knot starts to get unpicked, the lack of logic and clarity highlighted, then good things will follow. But it'll be a long hard slog. There are so many people so invested in this. And, not least, so many nice careers and fat salaries.

I’m gunning for 44 threads- apologies to Dirty Harry,

The 44th thread, the most powerful thread in the world and would blow your mind completely away, you've gotta ask yourself one question: "Do I feel lucky?" Well, do ya, punk?

Sorry.

^^this
But is the gravy train not ending? Stonewall’s budget has been significantly reduced - and these Tribunals are showing how costly it’s been to get so far “ahead of the law”? It won’t encourage organisations to increase their risks.

I still don't think there's been any significant cut through to people/organisations who aren't really engaged with the issues already. Most people, if they think about it at all, just have a vague sense of 'oh we are supposed to do things to help the poor trans people and we'd better follow advice because I don't have time or inclination to think about it much', and aren't countering that thought with info from tribunal results, etc.

The thing I still find extraordinary is how easily led so many of us are - that people accepted the 'training' in the first place without serious questioning or thought, and yet it seems to linger and be so hard to be dislodged in a way that would make you think they were genuinely committed to it. Is it really just people not wanting to look like they're making a fuss, or is it a broader human susceptibility to weird belief systems that fill some sort of psychological niche that is being leveraged?

I reckon it’ll reach 49 by July. Thank you nauticant and all the other well informed and often hilarious wims on these threads from
an appreciative lurker.

I wonder if the Darlington NHS case also had a young inexperienced equalities lead involved. I'm sure there'll be a pattern.