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

I will be very sorry if Michael Foran has left X as he is so good at explaining the law so that it makes sense.

The trans folk have prob made problems but he is still online here ..
https://substack.com/@michaelforan?r=uiqzc&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=profile

Yes. FW didn’t know nothin’! But then made these not so convincing very certain pronouncements on things which didn’t really seem tie in with all the noting of the women who were greeting, leaving, avoiding the female changing room when a man entered it.

Goodness, weren’t part of SP’s crimes noted by Upton as her being uncomfortable, leaving and waiting until a male had left the ‘stage set’ which the female only changing room seems to have become.

He has done this before when he needs a break. My guess is that he has been working very hard during the tribunal, so really needs a holiday. He is also in the process of moving from Glasgow to Oxford to take up his new post at Keble College in September. If something he said triggered any kind of pile-on yesterday evening, that would probably be the last straw.

ETA He posted this on his Substack early this morning: I’m travelling today but hope to go live tomorrow to discuss the remaining evidence heard in Peggie v NHS Fife and Dr Beth Upton.

Exactly this.

Just a reminder of just ONE of the reasons that robust safeguarding means no male people should be included in female single sex spaces regardless of what they believe their identity is. And no matter how any person tries to leverage in US survey statistics into a UK scenario where the situation is significantly different. (And yes, I am referring to the Williams Institute that keeps being referred to).

Even from puberty the weakest male people have a grip strength that is stronger than the weakest female people. But more importantly, as strength develops, by 15 years old, the weakest male people have stronger grip strength than 60% of female people of the same age. I remember seeing somewhere one of the scientists stating that most male adults have a grip strength higher than most female people.

And as we know from a couple of academic reviews, the average male adult has 2.6 x the punch power of the average female adult.

It is not just about privacy, as we are so often pointing out. Safeguarding is based on the risk that male people present.

Any person who understands that male people have a physical advantage over female people in sport, has to understand they have a significant disconnect in logic if that doesn't then flow through to female single sex spaces. I am not convinced that it is not a deliberate disconnect in logic and that they just cover over the dissonance.

It's about time, 'the other side' got their heads out their arse or looked up from a screen with short mantras and bothered to read the whole of these laws and bothered to understand them for themselves. Instead they listen to grifters, influencers and charlatans rather than using the brain cells of their own that they were given.

Basically wakey wakey, this is 2025 not 2018 or 2022. As the saying went 'Educate yourselves'. (Irony intended).

It's not the labour of women to do this for you. It's not like women were 'helped' to educate themselves when told to before is it? We had to get up off our arses and do it ourselves. So we did.

Fabulous post, & it complements what I saw on X yesterday:

https://x.com/latsot/status/1950203070563942760

It says (with bowdlerisation in case it's offensive on MN):

'Trans activist nonsense has created tens of thousands of gender critical people who are now more familiar with the law and the process of legislation than any other group in modern history.

Oops.'

& someone replied with this image (not sure where it will end up but here goes).

@BezMills

Passed the mosque this morning. It's definitely looking much better than it did. There seems to be a tiled roof on now, though the building still only has the first storey plus what might be a minaret. The intention is apparently to add the second storey and cupola, but based on the mosque website info, the mosque committee seems to want to get it open as a working mosque first.

If the area round about it were tidied up a bit, it would look absolutely fine IMO. I guess that the tidying up needs to include the path and accessible parking required by Building Standards. (There's a lot of overgrown grass, etc plus the screening is still just those metal mesh barriers that you get.)

A point re Fife's attitude to minority (for Fife) religions (raised by pps): a local chap in Leslie converted the Green Hotel into an Orthodox Church. (I don't think it's doing terribly well in terms of building its congregation - the now priest/father appears to be concentrating on charitable works these days.)

The church was targeted by vandals until the priest arranged for a Remembrance mural with soldier silhouette and poppy to be painted on the front gates. The vandalism stopped. Next thing, I saw that the church was getting a donation from a local Rangers supporters club...

It is remarkable really.

When you see people who insist that they have 'informed' views, yet what we see is that they have only emotional reasoning behind their 'informed' views. That they have unquestionably taken misinformation as being accurate facts. And that they then use emotionally manipulative tactics, such as shame, on others rather than simply stick to the facts.

Another article. Some women seem to have no boundaries when it comes to stripping off in front of males. Don’t understand it myself. Also the whole TP have been allowed to use SSS since 2010. 🤷🏻‍♀️

<a class="break-all" href="https://archive.is/2025.07.31-054110/www.thenational.scot/politics/25354138.must-protect-heart-scottish-nhs" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://archive.is/2025.07.31-054110/www.thenational.scot/politics/25354138.must-protect-heart-scottish-nhs/

Surprise!

@Helleofabore Its a good post, I did think that but...

It strikes me that some of these transwomen have come to genuinely believe that they are women. And this any woman objecting to their presence is as bigoted as someone objecting to a black woman (not that we've had bathroom segregation in the UK like the USA).

It's a religion/ideology first and foremost for some, not all.

Ironically that's the downfall because it allows no flexibility or pragmatism.

It strikes me that some of these transwomen have come to genuinely believe that they are women.

This would mean that they either think they have a female body, which they don't and are therefore factually wrong about, or they think that woman means something other than female - could be anything, they could genuinely think it means "fan of playing tiddlywinks" - but this has no bearing on biological sex so doesn't have any bearing on things that are for female people.

I suspect that deep down they know that if they were to describe what it is they mean by woman they would be shown to have problematic beliefs about women.

I had to smile at the tale from Leslie. I'm quite familiar with the place, you could say!

I have been in touch with (what's left of) the Church of Scotland churches in and around Glenrothes recently... their congregations are literally dying out, just like most places. Quite a shame, as they used to play quite a big part in the local communities, but Modern People are just not that interested in being involved, for various reasons.

I’ve just seen that FiM email on X - quite the thing. I expect no consequences for Currer or any of the recipients.

Also, just seen this which makes me wonder why the NHS and other arms length bodies spend so much on Freedom to Speak Up Guardians when there seem to be no mechanisms for attending to staff concerns or listening to them without wishing to send them to correction facilities.

https://x.com/TheParty1sOver/status/1950291892140384766

Is Potter not at all shocked at the revelations of the current state of the workplace that she governs? Does she have no care that they’ve embedded this toxicity into their policies and absence of policies, their hierarchies, and the staff’s mutual fear of each other.

It reeks of the Fife version of the Deptford People’s Project.

https://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3203804-The-Deptford-People-Project-and-the-impact-of-self-ID-and-transactivism-on-working-class-women

About to head out into the rain. I may be some time. So here's the continuation thread:

www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5383443-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-49

He got criticised/piled on last night, led by someone who has routinely and doggedly criticised him in the past (to put it politely). He made a comment about it and then deactivated. He did say a few days before though he might not be around so much as has a book to finish. So last straw is probably right.

Yes, some ‘may’ somehow genuinely think they they are female. It has been a significant failure of mental health support that they have been supported to believe this.

However, what other group in society has been supported to be able to be treated as their belief when it doesn’t reflect material reality? And why should it matter to protecting the needs of women and children?

There are people out there that genuinely believe that they are something they are materially not. Does any other person get to be treated as if they are something that they are objectively not even if they fully believe it?

What other group gets this special treatment?

I keep asking this question and have yet to have an answer that was comparative. I know you have done a lot of thinking about this belemonow so if you have a group in mind, I would love to hear about it.

“”It's a religion/ideology first and foremost for some, not all.*”

It is a belief, based on philosophical theory that they can be whatever they believe they are, for all people who have a transgender identity. As in there are no biological or neurological markers that can categorise someone as transgender or not transgender. Only belief.

It strikes me that some of these transwomen have come to genuinely believe that they are women.

I really don't care if they genuinely believe that about themselves, if they do then that is a failure of mental health support/a mental health issue and it is irrelevant inasmuch as they cannot force or compel other people to believe it even though they would very much like to as is shown by their behaviour over and over again.

Just seen foot-in-mouth email and claim Sandie was referred to NMC (which she clearly wasn't).

If her alleged misconduct was severe enough to be suspended pending investigation (though they already assumed her guilt), it was serious enough for an NMC referral. Why wasn't that made?

Probably because they knew they were talking shite

It's the same all over Fife. There's a Trinity Church in Leslie and another in Cowdenbeath, both formed by the amalgamation of three churches (including the one where I was married).

You'll know this, then, but each Trinity Church is now amalgamating with other churches. I'm just wondering how they'll come up with a name. Perhaps just Glenrothes Parish and Cowdenbeath Parish?

@BeeSourianteAgain I have absolutely no idea if GC are more likely to make racist comments than the average population, but as a BAME woman I'm fed up of the TRA appropriation of racism and homophobia to serve their ends.

Maybe they are. Similarly maybe those who are anti high levels of immigration may be more likely to hold racist views than average.

But that doesn't make immigration right if it is harmful to the overall population. It doesn't make transwomen in women's spaces right to the harm of women either.

Personally I haven't seen any racism on these pages and I would report it if I had. I have however, experienced racism on another forum by a TRA so there you go (their post was rightfully deleted).

@GailBlancheViola it's fair cleverer than that unfortunately they twist and distort the meaning of the word "woman" to include them.