NHS Fife tries to silence nurse - Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton - thread #43

[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 had been intended to be 28 July with 2 days of submissions from counsel meaning that the hearing was to have ended on 30 July. However, it became apparent as the hearing progressed that this schedule wouldn't be followed.

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 #40 can be found in this thread: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5379717-sandie-peggie-list-of-threads-covering-employment-tribunal-and-afterwards

Thread 41: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5379334-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-41 24 July 2025 to 25 July 2025
Thread 42: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5379820-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-42 25 July 2025 to 25 July 2025

Was he on annual leave when all this was going on?

That's what I was trying to say, @anyolddinosaur I'm itching to put in a foi to other prof regulators to find out how many other ones give you a new reg number if you change your gender. Not on holiday yet so it'll go in the procrastination pile of things to do!

Holy phone evidence Batman! JR trying to imply professional misconduct! The morning's evidence was completely bonkers!

Do we know if the phone will be re-examined? I'm guessing not.
Is there anything NC, CE & the IT guy JB can do about JR's implications? Would they take it further if they could does any one think?

And the dispute about whether Sandie commented on DrU's chromosomes has given JR an opening to muddy the waters by having a witness state that basically saying sex is super duper complicated and dragging DSDs into it?

Just when you think I can't be any more gobsmacked!

I'm still not caught up so apologies if my questions have been covered a thousand times already, and TIA to anyone who answers

😂. Some of them do seem to be off a lot as we have heard this week. They could have very generous holidays or David Miller is sat in his office somewhere thinking who are all these people?

I am going to howl with laughter if Lindsey Nicoll is from one of Upton's previous hospitals, and is giving evidence to back up SP's statement that he had caused chaos there. That's too much to hope for I assume though.

therre was a stray <u> in the first url

@Gymnopedie I agree it is hearsay at this point, but it is still very relevant evidence that parties were not treated equally in the internal investigation.

A disagreement Sandie had with a member of staff (which appears to be the fault of the other staff member) was discussed for the hearing as well as very vague racist rumours repeated as grounds for her suspension.

However, Dr. Upton's assertion there were no issues with any other colleagues was taken as fact.

@SternlyMatthews It must be catching, you have a stray R 😁

Can anyone explain the extra (3rd!?) bundle?

Unfortunately I think defence usually leaves their better witnesses until the end so I'm guessing not.

Note these are nurse associates so more junior than Sandie - they are between healthcare support workers and registered nurses.

The reason the phone notes are damning - if proven not contemporaneous - is that these notes are the foundation on which DU’s entire defence is built.

The contemporaneous note taking was said by AG to mean that DU was a more reliable witness than SP. So during the IX when their stories of what happened in the changing room differed, DU was believed. SP’s account was not.

DU said he’d changed clothes and used the loo, and was washing his hands when SP spoke. She was between him and the door.

SP says she was by the lockers when she spoke to DU who got undressed during their interaction and only left when she agreed to raise it through “proper channels “. DU was between her and the door.

Under oath in Part 1 there were lots of questions about who was where, when, what etc. SP was implacable and answered clearly. DU’s evidence was Ok but during the Panel questions was asked where were you standing when “x” happened? And Y happened? In a sequence. On the final (?) question DU said something like “presumably I would have been there by the bench” or similar. For me that undermined his story - someone who was telling the truth would simply say “I was by the bench” without any uncertainty or hypotheticals.

So why does DU’s case unravel if the phone notes are called into question? Why lie about something that appears innocuous?

1. DU’s story is much less convincing if he andmitted to undressing in front of SP - someone he claimed was aggressive and threatening.

2. A male undressing in front of a lone female at the end of a night shift - could potentially raise a lot of difficult questions about DU’s continued use of the CR. More likely for others to object?

The lies are all coming out now. No wonder JR is so rattled. I wonder if KS will ever be able to accept she was played?

I also noticed that MC stated that before the interview she had a call(?) with Dr Upton where he asked if she was aware he had a trans identity and she replied "I wondered"

🤔Why did you wonder MC?

I got a Loganair flight from Isle of Man to Manchester. Tunnocks caramel wafer and small cup of highland spring water was provided. 😁

Or was he the one who left the unmarked paper file on LM’s desk wiped clean of fingerprints?

Thanks @ickky. The Guidance Jo refers to is v good and reminds the academic community (students mostly) what academic freedom of speech actually is. And to expect their values to be challenged.
Its a bit sad that Jo hasn’t got back to normal despite winning. I wonder how winning will work out for Sandie. She will never get back her career and all the normal that came with it. The mental anguish leaves its toll.
It took me almost 5 years to get over an unfair dismissal by a petulant narcissistic man. I still occasionally ruminate about the unfairness and subsequent impact on my pension, which now affects my every day choices. But the saddest part was being abandoned by colleagues mostly women who I trusted. Ive read so so many similar stories on MN which helps me and now propels me to make a difference. 👍🤬😵

I forgot they record gender - and have for quite a while. So maybe Naomi needed his birth certificate from Scotland's People. No GRC so he hadnt been able to change it when I looked.

Medicine is a small world, it would be quite unusual for people not to know about how he had behaved elsewhere. However they still gave him a clinical fellow post when they had a lot of applicants. They were trying to polish their trans friendly credentials. It would be unkind to ask how that is working out for them.

I lost quite a few days watching Wimbledon before this started too, have done barely anything, and spent last weekend catching up on all the threads, newspaper articles and X posts. Which is what I’ll be doing this weekend too!

@Binglebong It think it was all the IT stuff. That's as technical as I get.

Nearly got here several times but I have finally, after days of speed-reading, caught up. Celery soup, henocidal chickens, altered notes, crying handmaidens, it's been a wild week. Thanks to @nauticant for your splendid thread-keeping, to @Justabaker and the TT crew and to @Bezmills for the Fifeisms.

Hello, been lurking and trying to keep up and I thought you might all enjoy my evenings ai creation..

That seemed to me like he was essentially trying to influence the decision ahead of the interview. Hire him and NHSF have immediately ticked a shiny inclusivity box, and he knew it. Just a thought I had.

Is it possible Dr Upton was still known as Theodore while he was at Ninewells Hospital where SP heard that he had "caused chaos"

From BBC "Dr Upton began gender transition in January 2022, uses the pronouns she/her, and had been "fully out in all aspects of my life" since August 2022, including at work"

We know he was known as Beth when he visited from the psychiatry placement based at Whytemans Brae (where SP says he complained after an elderly patient called him "son" and the student doctor didn;t support him as he would have liked)

He could have had 2 x 6 month placements Aug 22-July 23. But he couldn't have been fully out in all aspects of life when applying for the Aug 22 post?

Could one effect of the name change and GMC registration have been to obscure any work issues that occurred prior to Aug 22?

He was already working in the department, but only visiting to do psychiatry liaison as part of his role at another hospital base.

So the chat would likely have been in person, but still leaves open question as to what made her wonder when it was obvious BU is a woman!

That's a really good point! I hadn't considered that.

It made me wonder (ha!) had she been given the heads up about him, had she actually seen him or a photograph of him, or maybe there something about his application that made her think perhaps he was trans identified?

Ah so she had actually seen him! "I wondered" 🙄MC you used the magical power of all your senses woman, because it's bloody obvious he's a man!