NHS Fife tries to silence nurse - Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton - thread #48

[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 was 29 July 2025. It will resume again on 1 to 2 September for closing submissions.

The hearing commenced with Sandie Peggie giving evidence. Dr Beth Upton gave evidence from Thursday 6 February to Wednesday 12 February 2025. Sandie Peggie returned to give evidence on 29 July 2025.

Access to view the second part of 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: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5379717-sandie-peggie-list-of-threads-covering-employment-tribunal-and-afterwards

Thread 41: 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: 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
Thread 43: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5379979-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-43 25 July 2025 to 27 July 2025
Thread 44: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5380196-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-44 25 July 2025 to 28 July 2025
Thread 45: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5381518-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-45 28 July 2025 to 28 July 2025
Thread 46: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5381640-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-46 28 July 2025 to 29 July 2025
Thread 47: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5382102-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-47 29 July 2025 to 29 July 2025

Sandie's mum - she only gave testimony about Sandie being upset on Christmas Day?

Lottie Myles showed some clarity of thought in places.

It’s surprising that there is so much abuse directed at women standing up for their rights, from that community and their supporters, really. And not “correctly identifying sex” abuse, more death and rape threats style. Glasshouses and stones come to mind when it comes to other people’s social media.

Although she did reportedly say she would "make him into a woman", which is open to interpretation but probably didn't mean lending him her lipstick 😂

Certainly compared to the rest of them, yes she did.

And you are of course entitled to your opinion.

My point though was people’s feelings (and characteristics) are at the crux of it irrelevant here, it’s a simple case of what legally and procedurally should have been provided and wasn’t. The right to certain statutory conditions is not dependent on showing that you really, really want them and feel very, very strongly about it.

I think that the podium for "comes out worst" is shared by DU, Kate Searle and Lindsey Nicoll, but I don't know who I'd award which medal to.

No, you don't, a lot of the salt comes out when it drains and you do want a little salt in the pickle. I stick with the quantities from the recipe.

I'm going to assume you, like me, found it funny. But you could be castigating for implying rudeness about the people of Malaga 🤔

I'll never understand this take.

Women are in danger in the home, so let's undermine their safe spaces outside of the home? Do you hear yourself? Does that sound like an enlightened, pro-women position to you?

I just can’t find it in me to be that bothered about changing rooms when as women we are far more likely to face violence in our own homes from men we know

Well you might not be bothered. But Sandi Peggy wanted a space, free of men, to change after a flooding incident while on her period. And you think she shouldn't have that right, do you? That her dignity/privacy wasn't important?

I can't fathom this honestly. Don't you have any empathy for other women?

Did it occur to you that part of the reason we don't face more violence outside the home is because we women already police ourselves. We don't visit certain places, we don't run after dark, we use single-sex facilities when engaged in activities where we may be vulnerable, e.g. undressing, etc etc.

Yes, and when we do, often people take the view that when something bad happens we were partially responsible.

I'm finding this half way volte face by Tang very odd. They agree that sports and changing rooms should be single sex but then we're all being mean to people who try to invade them who are mostly wonderful.

I just can’t find it in me to be that bothered about changing rooms when as women we are far more likely to face violence in our own homes from men we know.

@Tangfastic71

We can worry about both.

I was very laid back about whether men claiming to be women should be allowed to use women's toilets at one point. My reasoning was that they had to be allowed to do so in order to 'live as a woman' for the designated period of time required for a GRC and to allow them to decide whether they really wanted to be women.

I changed my mind when Dolatowski tried to rape a wee girl in the toilets in Morrison's in Kirkcaldy.

How can anyone who is concerned about domestic violence not be concerned that men can get into women's refuges by claiming to be women? Or to force their victims to call them she/her if the case goes to court? Or to have the domestic violence stats skewed by male crimes being recorded as female ones, all on the say so of the men themselves?

Or if they're concerned about equality in the workplace, how can they not be worried that women who can't tolerate a mixed changing space won't have equal access to opportunities? Or that the stats for who's employed at the top and bottom levels will be skewed by men being recorded as women? How do we gauge the success of workplace equality for women when anyone can say he's a woman and be recorded as one?

It's nonsensical. How can you claim to care about these issues without thinking that it matters who the women are?

Sad sour times on Monday and Tuesday. Sandie's daughter did predict it would be bad but I didn't think it would go like it did. More proof of the process being the punishment. I still think that the previous witnesses (the medics) were mud slinging with the racist accusations.
On the Benidorm chat I got confused as to when Lindsay left it and at what point she called SP a fanny. Sounds like she was happy enough to go on holiday with her after Christmas Eve 23 but it was the ET that changed things.
Also if she was that anti Trump (pure!) herself she wouldn't have gone to the birthday 50th at Trump hotel.
Piece of work.

Some of the arguments that are put forward "this person is bad, so doesn't deserve as many rights", "these people are nice/vulnerable, so deserve to be accommodated" illustrate some of the mischaracterisation of the broadly GC position. We saw some of it in JR's questioning of the SM witness I think. Something along the lines of "you think people will or are pretending to be trans to get access to SSS" and we see it in the "you think all trans people are sex offenders".

It's far simpler, as has been said over and over again. SSS are separated on the basis of sex. The very fact the separation is allowable means that the case has effectively already been made that there is a need for that separation on the basis of sex - biological as clarified by the SC ruling. No male, nice, nasty, in a dress, in a bra, in dungarees, 103 years old, always lovely to his mother or whatever should be in there, and no female nice, nasty, racist, salt of the earth, terrible c*nt, or whatever should expect to have to share that space with a male.

That's it

I am asking these questions genuinely and with interest in your good-faith answer:

• You seem to be making a hierarchy of violence and how relatively important it is what kind/ where it takes place. Why is this?
• You are not bothered about sharing changing rooms with men. Fair enough. Do you feel that all other women should be not bothered? If so, why? Can you say where women with religious/cultural/past experience- related feelings fit into this?
• Do you feel that, in the context of women's rights, someone who is 'a homophobic racist with a vendetta' is less entitled to them than someone who has never forwarded a racist joke or worried about their child's sexual orientation? If so, can you say why?

What also occurred to me, which I didn't mention in my original post because I got sidetracked by the cat, is that even if the SC judgement was just about public boards, all parties to the appeal hearing agreed that the law is that MCW are men for the purposes of the EA if they do not have a GRC.
So he's a man anyway with or without the ruling. JR claims everyone else saw Upton as a woman, which will be tough for the Tribunal to swallow, because they have seen him. And if Sandie perceives him as a man, her objection to his presence is reasonable, since he is one. Isn't one of the justifications for SS spaces that you might reasonably object to the presence of a person of the opposite sex - examples given in the Act being communal toilets and changing rooms?
It's like saying that objecting, as a woman, to sharing a women's changing room with a man of a different race or ethnicity can only be because you are racist. But I think some TRAs would actually agree with this.

How can anyone who is concerned about domestic violence not be concerned that men can get into women's refuges by claiming to be women?

@ThatCyanCat

Precisely. Dolatowski was discharged from prison into a women's hostel (which also housed children) after being convicted of voyeurism against one little girl and attempted sexual assault of another. It beggars belief.

Don't know if this has been posted on here already. This is from LGB Alliance:

“We want homophobia to be taken seriously. We are appalled to see accusations of homophobia weaponised, without any evidence, against a nurse who simply asserted her right to a single-sex changing room at work.”

Also, having read some of the coverage in more detail, I was appalled to see this question from JR:

"I find it suspicious that you, a working class woman, managed to find the money to defend yourself in court, because this is usually something only the wealthy can afford. I wouldn’t ask a rich person where they got their money, of course. That would be terribly rude."

Couldn't be more clear that this is about class, at least as far as JR is concerned.

My reasoning was that they had to be allowed to do so in order to 'live as a woman' for the designated period of time required for a GRC and to allow them to decide whether they really wanted to be women.

And we now know, from FWS3, that "living as a woman" is just name changes on documents. Using women's facilities is no longer expected or required.

Are those the actual words she used? I thought JKR said that as a paraphrase to make the point that JR was being classist and wouldn't have asked such question of a wealthy witness. Which I think is probably true but I don't think those are her actual words.

"I find it suspicious that you, a working class woman, managed to find the money to defend yourself in court, because this is usually something only the wealthy can afford. I wouldn’t ask a rich person where they got their money, of course. That would be terribly rude."

JR didn't actually say this. It was a sarcastic paraphrase by the person tweeting. JR tried to ask who was funding the case but thankfully got shut down by the judge after counsel's objection.

ETA: Ha! A flurry of cross-posting.

Did JR actually ask that?

I thought that was JKR sarcastically (and accurately) summarising the subtext of what JR meant.