NHS Fife tries to silence nurse - Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton - thread #33

[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 resumed 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] by 5pm on Wednesday 9 July. Detailed instructions were provided here:

drive.google.com/file/d/16-9POEZ7yHWUr6EmbfquJZO18Gv78bSm/view

The hearing is being live tweeted by x.com/tribunaltweets and there's additional information here: tribunaltweets.substack.com/p/peggie-vs-fife-health-board-and-dr-005 and tribunaltweets.substack.com/p/peggie-vs-fife-health-board-and-dr-bd6. 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.ph/WSSjg.

An alternative to Twitter is to use Nitter: nitter.net/tribunaltweets or nitter.poast.org/tribunaltweets

Links to previous threads #1 to #29 can be found in the header of thread #30.

Thread 30: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5375337-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-30
Thread 31: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5375819-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-31
Thread 32: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5376072-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-32

I wouldn't wish a wish there on my worst enemy, let alone a friendly MNer!

I think Sandie might need to raise a grievance or a female patient would need to complain before GMC will investigate.

Which is actually the opposite of what a cab rank is, as you have to choose the first waiting taxi at a rank!

I woke up this morning and for some reason I thought it was Monday and got all excited. Then I realised it's Sunday.

Is it bad that for probably the first time in my life I was disappointed that Sunday wasn't Monday?

Here is the Ground Floor plan (from the planning app). Why couldn't they have used a decent high-def scanner. If you can make sense of the text, you have better eyes than I have (which isn't tricky, TBF):
https://planning.fife.gov.uk/online/files/F3B04A4AEDC4D5E6106DB9CB5261B6A4/pdf/07_01142_CFULL-GROUND_FLOOR_PLAN_INDICATING_LINKS_TO_EXISTING_HOSPITAL-109284.pdf

If Dr Upton claims to be biologically female...... but identifies as transgender ..... does that make him (gasp) a man?!

I get document unavailable(?)

The terms of detention under the mha 1983 are that a person must be suffering from a mental illness of a nature and degree, with a risk to themselves or others, that warrants detention in hospital or assessment or treatment. That is a short precis and it's three years since I retired as an amhp, so I am a little rusty. I have detained God, Moses, a chap who believed he was his own psychiatrist, and one who believed he was a famous Holywood actor. They all posed a level of risk to themselves or others.

I've been scared of tents since I woke up to find a cow at my flap. I'm now searching for an estate car so I can car-camp instead. But that's entirely irrelevant to this thread so I'll say no more on the subject of camping

Been following the case and i've probably missed this and someone has already explained.

How did they know about the Kate Searle emails and they were missing from the bundle in February.

As in if they were never disclosed, how did they know to go after them?

My dad said to me last night, "You won't have had the Peggie tribunal to follow today, with it being a weekend." He got a stern lecture from me last week after declaring it a waste of time because "everybody knows there are only two sexes" and now at least has some understanding of why I've been glued to the coverage.

Re peaking the biggest thing for me is seeing lots of clever, well educated, nice friends still down at sea level posting beeee kind memes and slagging off JKR and I want to scream at them, I want to drag them up the mountain and show them the view from here. Sadly I'm not brave enough to out myself. It would make me (and by default my DH and DCs) absolute social outcasts from a hobby we all share and I'm not ready to do that but I'm horrified every time I see a scientist, an academic, a phD, someone who works in a hospital etc 'like' a post that is so anti science. I don't get how they can't see it, why these clever people don't ever question the narrative, how nothing that has happened in the last few years has made them think 'I'll just pop my trainers on and have a gentle stroll up that low hill over there and see what all the fuss is about'.

@cascade31 It sounds like there was a reference to the email somewhere but the actual email was not included. So Naomi knew something was missing but not exactly how helpful it would be. JR tried to say Naomi was on a fishing expedition. She caught some good ones.

Interesting to see the assumption that consultants would all back a temporary medical member of staff against an experienced nurse they’d been working with for years. We actually had such a he said she said conflict, though not concerning trans, between a bloody good nurse and a fixed term locum consultant. Every substantive consultant in the department wrote a statement in support of the nurse. Who was cleared. Yes, with trainees you have to avoid pissing off the training school, but no one wants to lose a good experienced nurse. My gut feeling is that the other consultants who were emailed didn’t respond because they were hiding under their desks praying it would all go away, as it involved the live wire of trans politics, and they didn’t want to get electrocuted. Understandable, but a tad cowardly.

If anyone has the time and wants to take the trouble to find that in the TT reports I and I’m sure a lot of others would be very grateful. If not, I will, later today.

I’m way behind.

That was what I was referring to really. The fact they held delusional beliefs wasn't the reason they were detained. But the nature/degree in which these beliefs affected them/ posed a risk to themselves or others.
Personally I think that believing you are the opposite sex is just as bonkers as believing you are Isis, but in my opinion the difference here is that Upton and the likes demand that everyone in the workplace and public life, agree he is a woman, whereas as someone demanding that everyone agree they are some ancient godess would be seen as completely barmy and no one would go along with it

What would have happened if they had been met with a man telling them he was a woman?

1. They're already outed. 99% of their colleagues know, especially the women.

2. If uni employers fail to enforce single-sex facilities, they too will lose expensive & embarrassing legal challenges.

I'm so old, I was a manager during the prohibition of workplace smoking. Many places had resistant smokers, the same excuses were trooped out again and again. It's my human rights, you're discriminating against me, nobody else minds, we all smoke in here, it helps me concentrate, blah blah.

Just needs a clear, firm approach from management. Collusion and blind-eye is the easy, wrong approach that leaves an organisation wide open to costly liabilities.

The local paper The Courier which has done a great job reporting on this has just published an exclusive saying that staff within NHS Fife are now calling for the resignation of the CEO.
www.thecourier.co.uk/fp/politics/5293043/nhs-fife-staff-boss-resignation-sandie-peggie/?fbclid=IwQ0xDSwLpzkNleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHkUVS0waMdzRcIwnFtWJJyeLkYH6SPH2fTwe3VkFBve91xrXX5a9smUm31Po_aem_9PQp3xWIN1os0DXQ3fLQtA

Good question. If I was trans-Moses, I'd be most unimpressed by a TW telling me I'm not Moses and trying to section me.

I know this isn't the question you're asking but I've worked on several MH wards where patients did make comments about trans identified male patients on the ward AND a trans male member of staff.
What's a man doing here? That's a man! Why is nurse '*James' wearing woman's clothes now?

It was extremely difficult for the patients and for members of staff who didn't want to go along with it. I've never come across a trans male doctor on a ward though.

Edited for spelling

I would think it wouldn't help them to shed their delusions or even recognise that they are delusions. When a man is standing there telling you he's a woman, does it not reinforce to you that you can't trust your senses and anything might be true? If he's a woman, why can't I be Moses?

Thank you that explains it... It's been bugging me over the last week.

I was hoping that someone was on Sandy's side and tipped her off an email had been sent ... Maybe not then !!

I am trying to imagine the fall out! It would be an impossible situation and I do believe that it would pose a risk to a patients mental health of they were to be treated by a trans identified man.