NHS Fife tries to silence nurse - Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton - thread #26

[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 doubtful whether pubilc access for remote viewing would be reinstated but recent developments (as of mid May) suggest that this might actually become available again.

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
Thread 23: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5285690-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-23
Thread 24: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5301295-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-24
Thread 25: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5318518-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-25

But didn’t the costs just include legal fees? Because there are also all the hours of internal time used in prep

Indeed. And how can you say it doesn’t impact patient care when it has required nurses and doctors, including consultants, to take time away from caring for patients?

And their reputation.

The NHS is very dependent on public trust and support. The case has been followed by workers across the NHS and elsewhere.

Two questions this whole scandal raises for me are:
How much money is the NHS wasting on ideological rather than medical (or closely related) work?
How safe would I be in various NHS hospitals if it was known I had firm gender critical views?

maybe questions for Wes Streeting @nauticant

How safe would I be in various NHS hospitals if it was known I had firm gender critical views?

I was being criticised earlier on this thread for saying doctors must not discriminate in their treatment of patients. I was being told by PP that it was OK so long as other doctors could cover for them.

Excellent questions.

As a lesbian, the sight of all the rainbow lanyards is enough to make damn sure I would not out myself to any member of staff. It's a threatening sign: I'm sure if it was a case of making trans activists have to accept care from women wearing 'adult human female' t shirts everyone would be fainting in coils. And those women would not be representing a belief system that is frequently and openly threatening to hurt or kill people who disagree with them.

You do not bring political or religious views to work when providing a public service. This is what 'equality' means. Accessible to all, the exact same standards and care for all. Even the ones you don't agree with. Even the ones you don't like. Even the ones who live differently to you. Even the ones who don't vote like you.

DEI went beserk with a public front and marketing and money, but somehow it became solely about gender politics which is very much not a tolerant or diverse movement, and all of this has been completely lost and forgotten.

You repeatedly misrepresented what I said. My point is that, where there are competing rights, it isn't always straightforward to determine how the courts would decide. You appear to be of the view that your right not to be discriminated against as a woman trumped a doctor's right not to be discriminated against due to his or her religion. That is not necessarily how the courts would view it, especially if you don't suffer any detriment as a result of the doctor's expression of his or her beliefs.

The NHS cannot refuse to treat you due to your GC beliefs. Since there are, as far as I am aware, no WORIADS beliefs that say GC women should not be treated, any member of staff who refuses to treat you due to your beliefs can be disciplined. This is, of course, why trans activists, try to get around it by regarding any expression of GC beliefs as aggressive abuse, which allows them to refuse to treat you. I haven't seen any cases where this has actually happened but, if it does, I would like to see the affected individual take the NHS to court.

Ah, you have come back again to tell me how the NHS can discriminate against patients….

I agree - and I got something else from your excellent post, Raven, I googled the wonderful 'fainting in coils' and traced it back to Alice in Wonderland.

Thank you - every day a school day here😃

I am very much looking forward to hearing the evidence from the DEI.
I’d really like to know the origins of the “policy” she was following when she told Sandie’s manager Upton couldn’t be excluded from the ladies.
Someone said upthread, who I think was involved with the NHS audit on here, there was no policy!!
And even if there was a policy EVERYONE in Scotland knew self ID was not legal after the Scot Gov GRA and Isla Bryson fiascos!

Someone else on here will have the link, but I’m fairly certain that a woman was refused treatment (iirc had her operation for cancer cancelled?) because she said that she wanted an actual female nurse. And of course one of the Darlington nurses was threatened with having her treatment refused for being transphobic because she asked for “Rose” not to be on her operating team for a gynaecological op. So, NHS trusts are indeed refusing or threatening to refuse treatment to GC people.

eta, I do totally agree that this should not in any way be happening. Just wanted to point out that it is.

The NHS cannot refuse to treat you due to your GC beliefs.

I'm fairly sure that policies have been identified with examples (try the NHS thread with people checking policies) that involved denying care to non compliant women who protested men on their wards/offering them care as a single sex HCP.

There was the woman told she could not have her op if she refused the male nurse (who walked into a room where she was having an intimate procedure and made a point of making his presence felt to her before leaving), and had to fight to get urgent care.

As the Fife and Darlington nurses case show, the NHS (and everyone else) relies on most women not having the nerve, time, energy, finances and mental strength to fight them for years through the courts. Even when it gets to court they stand there shamelessly defending the oppression of women in the name of the god of Gender. Yes, they are openly biased and we're living in a time where this movement is trying to be more powerful than the law of the country. And stupid berks like Starmer are standing there watching it happen.

It is truly stupid because that's the door open, for the next movement that wants to try this, and they may want something more than women's rights.

Not just this case how much has ScotGov spent on this nonsense in total. Including money spent pushing the illegal polices in the first place, in all aspects of life.

£160k on the Supreme Court case, £220k so far on NHS Fife, that we know off.

Was there lawyers involved in the Isla Bryson stuff, which prison do you put a rapist?
Has there been any legal cases involving schools so far?

"You do not bring political or religious views to work when providing a public service. This is what 'equality' means. Accessible to all, the exact same standards and care for all. Even the ones you don't agree with. Even the ones you don't like. Even the ones who live differently to you. Even the ones who don't vote like you.
DEI went beserk with a public front and marketing and money, but somehow it became solely about gender politics which is very much not a tolerant or diverse movement, and all of this has been completely lost and forgotten."

This from @TheOtherRaven nails it in my view. I have had a long career in the public sector, various roles and this ethos was at the core of it when I started and one of the reasons I went into it. It is difficult to pinpoint when it started to change but the rot really set in about 10 years ago.

I'm too late to edit.

Yes money has been spent on schools, a couple took Borders to court over gender neutral toilets in schools.
So add up the cost of creating them.
The legal costs
Then the cost of changing back to single sex.

I’m grateful for your well judged and informative posts, thank you

With respect to your professional expertise, I think you may be (unintentionally) giving a misleading impression when you write “You appear to be of the view that your right not to be discriminated against as a woman trumped a doctor's right not to be discriminated against due to his or her religion.”

The court doesn’t have to pick between a doctors right not to be discriminated against by a patient and a patients right not to be discriminated against by the doctor.

The patient doesn’t owe any duty to the doctor in law that has to be balanced against their rights.

The doctor’s rights, such as they are, are against their employer. It’s the employer that has to square that circle, a court can’t excuse discrimination against a patient by a doctor, by saying it’s “balancing” that right against a duty owed to the doctor by a third party.

IIRC, the hospital refusing surgery to the cancer patient is a private hospital - the Princess Grace Hospital.

The Darlington Nurse who was denied treatment unless she agreed to 'Rose' being involved in the operation was NHS though.

GMC states doctors:

Personal beliefs and medical practice
56. You must not abuse, discriminate against, bully, or harass anyone based on their personal characteristics, or for any other reason. By ‘personal characteristics’ we mean someone’s appearance, lifestyle, culture, their social or economic status, or any of the characteristics protected by legislation – age, disability, gender reassignment, race, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation.

Conscientious objection
8 You may choose to opt out of providing a particular procedure because of your personal beliefs and values, as long as this does not result in direct or indirect discrimination against, or harassment of, individual patients or groups of patients. This means you must not refuse to treat a particular patient or group of patients because of your personal beliefs or views about them.5 And you must not refuse to treat the health consequences of lifestyle choices to which you object because of your beliefs.6

As I recall in that case the patient had gone private & it was not an NHS hospital.

This is why the question is moot not just that no religion has a prohibition on treating patients of the opposite sex but because it would be unethical for a doctor to refuse to treat a patient. A doctor who refused to treat any patient could be struck off.*

*There are situations where you can legitimately refuse treatment. I am a retired A&E consultant & on a handful of occasions in my career I have not only refused treatment but ejected the patient from the department. Generally this has been when the patient has either assaulted &/or abused a member of staff (particularly racial abuse). Usually they were intoxicated. None had life threatening conditions. Generally we just put up with an awful lot of shit from patients but if an aggressive obnoxious patient refused to leave the department I have threatened & on one occasion actually called the police to arrest the individual. Now I think of it all these patients were male.😀

And you have misrepresented me yet again. I have not at any point said that the NHS can discriminate against patients.

If a doctor can as you claim, despite being in breach of GMC rules, then the NHS is.

Now waiting for your little fan club to appear to say how thoughtful you are and how wonderful you are to respond.