NHS Fife tries to silence nurse - Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton - thread #40

[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
Thread 33: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5376608-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-33
Thread 34: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5377387-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-34
Thread 35: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5377598-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-35
Thread 36 mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5378031-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-36
Thread 37: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5378200-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-37
Thread 38: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5378463-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-38
Thread 39: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5378747-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-39

This was about 2 years ago now, so may be too late?

that is why this bit is batshit

“It is important if you have an issue or a problem that you speak to your line manager, I don’t think it is something we as colleagues should be doing to each other.”

imagine escalating every tiny little thing to a manager instead of just saying "oi, Carole, please stop microwaving fish in the break room"

@SerafinasGoose I'm so very sorry that you went through that. I went through similar. The isolation and destruction of reputation is soul destroying.
There are so many of these people in workplaces. I'm so glad that Sandie has the support to expose what she has endured.

I think the game here from NC's side is that, assuming they will prevail in at least part of SP's claims, how damning will the judgment be in criticising specific individuals. One goal is to get individual accountability when, currently, genderists are assuming that they're safe in numbers.

I remembered this case https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/nov/19/baby-girl-registered-wrong-sex-mansfield-registration-office

Not everyone is born in hospital though.

Perhaps this also explains the odd references to racism and homophobia. I couldn't understand how they are relevant to the case as NHS Fife have not claimed that this led to her suspension and there are no notes about this on her employment file. But maybe the idea is to limit damages by painting her as undeserving? Would a judge be influenced by that?

her option would be to sicknote MSF iirc

How to encourage spiteful tittle tattle and discourage adult conversations where compromise can be achieved.

The respondents seem keen to bring up unsubstantiated past rumours about Sandie, and yet Upton's allegedly previous form for claiming about misgendering seems to get a free pass....

NC tying AG in knots about whether it was all about the CR incident, or also about the 3 other ones... seems unclear.

Presumably a midwife is at least in attendance.

Wouldn't they supply these details?

|Thank you for that clarificaiton - gap in my knowledge and very interesting!

JR is trying to paint a picture of SP being a difficult and dangerous individual, so the tribunal might think the way they got there might not be perfect but ultimately the NHS was right to take the actions they did. For example one of the defences to unfair dismissal claims, is to show that the employee would have been dismissed regardless even if the process was constructive.

‘No, that’s er, sorry, what were you saying?’

’I don’t recall’ incoming.

This is exactly how it is now. I had a wee word with a junior colleague whose attitude towards a patient was inappropriate (in my opinion). I had no desire to report him and was hoping a wee word would sort him out.

However, he complained about me to management. On discussion with management, they (thankfully) agreed with my approach and thanked me for trying not to waste their time with minor issues. 😂

She's starting to get a little tangled up isn't she.

Brilliant. You nailed it!

This just too easy for NC, I can imagine her at some point saying, ‘come on, at least make me work for it even a little bit!’ 😂

The NHS pension has no simple answers. Assuming she wants to claim without reductions for early payment:

The pension she's earnt since April 2022 can be claimed at 67.

The pension earnt between April 2015 and March 2022 can be taken at 67 or whatever the age is for the rest of the pension below. At 67 it will be worth more, but she won't get it for as long as if she takes the lower value earlier.

The rest of the pension might be 55, 60 or 65. This depends on whether she paid in as a student, whether she was part of the misselling that led a lot of students to withdraw their pension payments at qualification, the exact date she started work, whether she's had any breaks from nursing (or from paying into the pension while working), what choice she made in Choice 1 in 2008 or Choice 2 in 2015, and whether she's employed in a nursing role at the point of retirement.

Well as NHSF are leaning on this aspect so much, I hope this will be addressed in summation. Sandie did try to use the proper channels to no avail it seems.
But maybe it's not clear cut enough

Irrespective of the outcome NHS Fife will be paying for this in the long run.

The audacity of a part-time nurse, only doing a few night shifts a week, has bitten them well and truly on the arse.

Sorry. Double post

10/10

NC - You start that letter [reads 'attend lx meeting and allegations']. Look back at letter u say was sent on 15th may
AG : additional allegations yes
J - wait for question
NC - [reads] if that had been sent wouldn't u expect the next letter to say something apologetic That goalposts had moved
AG - the first was described and explained on 12th April and then letter sent to SP 15th may theres 3 further allegations. Letter 19th says all allegations prev discussed
NC - but nothing about 'further to my letter of 15th may'?

NC has suggested that letter of 15th was never actually sent to SP, so extra allegations were sprung on her.
AG explained that she would have passed it on to be posted, not posted herself.