NHS Policy Audit - working party

[KnottyAuty]

Following on from Thread #23 of the Peggie v NHS Employment Tribunal. Anyone who wants to help with survey/audit of paperwork against the Equality Act protected characteristics please join here 😊

So true. It's a massive grift with certain groups and individuals making a massive income out of promoting discrimination against women and girls, lesbians & gay men and any other group that gets in the way of their insatiable demands for dominance.
Politicians failure to exercise due diligence is shameful and as ever, raises serious questions about their insight, ethics and values.

“Forking over eye-watering amounts of cash”

In the end it will probably be this that does for them. With huge public sector cuts being made and 1 million people to come off disability benefits… this sort of job-creation-scheme lobby funding is going to upset a lot of people…

Valentine has not yet appeared as a witness so will be interesting. They were going to take him after ED.
This from Weds 12th Feb pm, ptII - archive.ph/fqdBN

from screenshot, which disapeared:
JR: NC and I have discussed. We would like to call ED. There is likely to be further documents released overnight, we accept may mention ED and we may need to call her back another time.
JR: Then VV and IB on Friday.
JR: And re timing, we are looking at July -
J July?!

Thanks - for some reason I thought VV was before DU. Getting ahead of myself!

I’ve re-checked the last day TT so I get it in my diary and stock up on tunnocks:

15 April - video hearing of legal teams to discuss order for DU’s phone and KS as R3

16-28 July Part 2 hearing (plus further 2 days?)

Witnesses left we know about: KS, VV, IB but possibly DU asked back if the phone is brought in and other disclosures?

I’ve sent it off to a few places and had a couple of holing messages back. Will probably be next week before anything comes of it - theres lots to check I suppose.

Well done everyone for your hard work.

We’ve proved that there are no protected single sex spaces in NHS Scotland for either staff or patients.

That’s a big deal - which will be a shock to the average person/taxpayer - so thanks for all your hard work!

Thank you for the update Knotty that headline alone should get some interest even if its only in Scotland.

I will have some time off over the weekend and hope you can all manage the same, but if you can mull over what our next steps could be that would be useful?

The Jotform was really clunky and didn't fit well with what we all found. How should we alter it if, we are going to have a go at a few of the English trusts next? We have a few volunteers...

Clearly there are no "changing room policies". There seem to mostly be DEI policies and their monitoring reports - so general they were almost useless - often conflated sex/gender/sexual orientation.

Then there are transgender employee policies about 50% of the time which were illuminating.

We found one "single sex ward" policy which was egregious.

So maybe I need to re-jig the form just to suit those 3 searches - with a box to indicate where information wasn't available on the website and had to be gleaned from other places via FOI?

Suggestions please?!

Maybe centre it around specific issues rather than policies - what can you find out about: single sex wards, trans employees, changing rooms, toilets, etc, then where the info is from - policy, FOI, guidance, EIA etc?

I've realised that we don't have quite enough evidence to back up the statement I made above - we will need to get the rest of the transgender policies to confirm. We were missing:

1. Ayrshire & Arran
2. Fife
3. Grampian
4. Greater Glasgow
5. Tayside
6. Western Isles

Who was it that managed to make contact with MBM?
Might they be able to help us out?

@KnottyAuty, am I right in thinking these are missing documents from trusts we’ve already done? So we need either a document that says “this is our policy** on transgender people,” or we need to attempt to show that it’s not publicly available?

** or “guidance” or “suggestions” or whatever because sometimes they’re slippery and don’t use the term policy so they don’t have to do an IA, cough Lothian cough.

Can we rally the troops? I can spend a bit of time googling today.

@KnottyAuty I think it was @SternlyMatthews who had a contact with MBM.

Lisa MacKenzie posted a thread so I tweeted back asking for a link to one of the policies, & she replied with a link to the copy they downloaded, referenced in their 2022 blog article,
https://murrayblackburnmackenzie.org/2022/12/03/the-erosion-of-single-sex-hospital-accommodation-in-scotland/

which links mostly to their copies relating to the ones you asked for.

Knotty's list of the nhs boards, assembled from the bog, with titless & links to MBM copies. Please see the blog for their notes

1. Ayrshire & Arran "Supporting Trans Service Users "
2. https://murrayblackburnmackenzie.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/1.-NHS-Ayrshire-and-Arrran.-Supporting-Trans-Service-Users-Policy.pdf
3. ‘has been adapted from the NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde Gender Reassignment Policy and developed through consultation with trans representatives and the Scottish Trans Alliance’ (2021: part 1).
4. Fife none
5. "NHS Fife is Scotland’s sixth largest health board and did not provide any policies or guidance relating to patient care. It did however provide an assorted range of other literature, mostly from external bodies" --MBM
6. Grampian "Guide for Staff - to help them meet the needs of Trans Patients attending for Hosptical Care"
7. https://murrayblackburnmackenzie.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/6.1-NHS-Grampian-Trans-Booklet-April-2019.pdf
8. Greater Glasgow "Gender Reassignment Policy "
9. https://www.nhsggc.org.uk/media/265856/gender-reassignment-policy-review-2021-revised.pdf
10. Tayside
11. NHS Tayside provided links to its Dignity & Privacy (Single Sex Accommodation) Policy (2018),1 as well as it Embracing Equality, Diversity and Human Rights Policy (2017) and Gender-Based Violence Employee Policy (2017).
12. see long notes in blog
13. Western Isles "Equality and Human Rights Policy May 2017"
14. https://murrayblackburnmackenzie.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/13.1-NHS-Western-Isles.pdf
15. "NHS Western Isles provided a copy of its broad brush Equality and Human Rights Policy, applicable to all protected characteristics." --MBM

Thanks all! Very helpful - these ones were missing from the NHS website scrapes - but fortunately MBM gives the names of the policies.

The Glasgow one is a total shocker!
It is a 2021 policy but this review document is from 2023 which is after the updated EHRC guidance came out and I think it makes completely false claims

https://www.nhsggc.scot/downloads/gender-reassignment-policy-review-2021/

pp5 Where in-patient accommodation remains configured by sex (female/male only wards), patients with the protected characteristic of gender reassignment will be offered services in line with current guidance from the Equality and Human Rights Commission that uses an example stating –

‘An organisation which is providing separate sex services or single-sex services should treat a transsexual person according to the gender they identify with (as opposed to the physical sex they were born with). The service provider can only exclude a transsexual person or provide them with a different service if they can objectively justify doing so.

I have searched the EHRC guidance and this is what they actually say:

https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/equality/equality-act-2010/separate-and-single-sex-service-providers-guide-equality-act-sex-and

• To establish a separate or single-sex service, you must show that you meet at least one of a number of statutory conditions (set out in this section of the guide) and that limiting the service on the basis of sex is a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim. For example, a legitimate aim could be for reasons of privacy, decency, to prevent trauma or to ensure health and safety. You must then be able to show that your action is a proportionate way of achieving that aim.
• There are circumstances where a lawfully-established separate or single-sex service provider can prevent, limit or modify trans people’s access to the service.

I think, given that one is literally tied to one‘s bed unable to move and/or drifting in and out of consciousness, being in hospital is the last place male bodies should be allowed near female bodies…- this is in terms of the “legitimate aim” of keeping females safe from sexual assault.

Oh that’s some neat (read nasty) sleight of hand on the wording change there. Close enough to the original to slide past someone who wasn’t paying attention. But not close enough for the eagle-eyed vipers on Mumsnet!

@KnottyAuty, does that mean we have everything? Anything still missing? Shout if we need to trawl.

I've done more trawling to fill the gaps...

Looking again at the ones which don't have transgender employee policies:

Ayrshire & Arran - Got it from Sternly's trawl through MBM's article - thanks!

Fife - uncovered some obstructive FOIs from 2024 where they avoid handing over a trans policy, but in Feb 2025 someone has referenced minutes to confirm that a policy now exists - but Fife have said they don't respond to FOI unless a full name is given. In combination with SP's ET we have all we need there.

Grampian - staff guide for transgender patients also from MBM's blog. Bit of an odd document - on the one hand differentiates between fully transitioned and not, but doesn't say what "fully" means. So how does this help staff?

Greater Glasgow - They have a gender reassignment policy review. As noted above it quotes completely false "guidance" supposedly from the EHRC so that's clear (and shockingly awful)

Orkney - somehow missed this off my list earlier - nothing - one assumes there is no need for any documents due to low population size. But I have a policy which says they contract their gender reassignment policies to Grampian. So we can assume they have adopted their policy? Unless anyone can think of a better idea I will go with that.

Tayside - we already had the single sex policy which is pretty clear - we can infer it also covers staff.

Western Isles - similar to Orkney - but there are references to policy documents which exist. But I have found the gender reassignment section on their website which says they contract to Greater Glasgow. So we can assume they have adopted their policy? Unless anyone can think of a better idea I will go with that.

Also found this today which is interesting:
https://www.publications.scot.nhs.uk/files/dl-2024-21.pdf
There are 4 specialist health boards for GR services:
• NHS Grampian
• NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde
• NHS Highland
• NHS Lothian

So on the basis of this last push, we don't have 100% nailed on proof, but based on the documents we have, we can certainly assume that there are NO protected single sex spaces left in NHS Scotland.

Sorry @KnottyAuty I thought I had said that about Orkney - yes they use Grampian DEI as they are too small to have their own DEI person and use their policies (what few policies they have!)

Brilliant work. Hats off to all!

regarding Knotty’s comment on Fife: “Fife - uncovered some obstructive FOIs from 2024 where they avoid handing over a trans policy.”

The DEI officer at Fife in 2024 was IB. Would it have been her crafting the obstructive FOIs, or declining to hand over a trans policy? These are not the actions of someone entirely innocent (by dent of ignorance, inexperience or whatever). I used to have a tiny bit of sympathy for her, but it’s evaporating.

@KnottyAuty do you have all you need? I have some time now to search if need be.

Thanks!
I've updated my note to add in the references and I have sent it around all the press contacts. Fingers crossed.

I've gone with saying that it looks 95% certain that there are no single sex spaces left in NHS Scotland for staff or patients - but it is not OK for it to be this difficult to find out. The NHS is supposed to be honest, respectful and transparent.

This seems to suggest they are obstructive, opaque and discriminatory.

Trying to work out how to get you a copy of the updated note...

I found this a few days ago and the "no debate" technique is mentioned:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minority_influence

Interesting

@KnottyAuty re “fully transitioned” - vague, and in any event how would you know since you can’t ask for GRCs (privacy) and sex markers are not reliable indication , given that they might have been altered based on de facto self ID…

Michael Forman (lecturer in public law at University of Glasgow), says there is no law preventing you asking to see a GRC:

Dr Michael Foran

@michaelpforan

“There is no law saying you can’t ask to see a GRC. There is a law that says you cannot disclose information about someone’s sex or their GRC if you come across it in an official capacity. The claim that you cannot ask is entirely fabricated.”
https://x.com/michaelpforan/status/1720398606216183910

and

“It would be impossible to implement any distinction in law based on GRC status if it was a crime to ask someone if they have a GRC. There is no law against asking and, following FWS3, in many cases you will need to in order to know your legal obligations towards that person.”

So if I am the 16 year old leisure centre assistant at the pool, I can ask? That’s interesting…