"Darlington Nurses" vs County Durham and Darlington NHS Trust Tribunal Thread

[ThreeWordHarpy]

Five nurses working at Darlington Memorial Hospital have filed a legal case suing their employer, an NHS trust, for sexual harassment and sex discrimination. The nurses object to sharing the women’s changing facilities with a male colleague, “Rose”, who:

• identifies as female
• has not undergone any physical or hormonal transition and has full male genitalia
• has cited inclusivity policies
• is backed by the trust’s HR department
• has been granted access to a single-sex changing room for women.

The NHS trust’s HR department dismissed the nurses’ concerns, stating they should “broaden their mindset” and “be educated”. More details can be found at Sex Matters

The hearing is due to start on October 20th and is scheduled to last 3 weeks. To view the hearing online email: [email protected] [[email protected]] requesting remote access to the case of 2501192/2024 Hutchinson and others Vs County Durham and Darlington NHS Trust, starting 20th October. Also include your full name and your role in the hearing (eg member of the public or observer). Note, it is likely you will need the same full name and email address to log into the hearing, and the name will be visible to other observers.

The hearing will be live tweeted by https://x.com/tribunaltweets. An alternative to Twitter is to use Nitter: nitter.net/tribunaltweets or nitter.poast.org/tribunaltweets. Tribunal Tweets have more background to this case on their substack, including links to their coverage of the earlier hearings.

In earlier hearings reported at http://archive.today/nh5v9, the claimants were supported by the Christian Legal Centre and represented by Pavel Stroilov (solicitor) and Bruno Quentaville (barrister). The respondents were represented by Simon Cheetham KC. We do not know yet if the same representation will be in place for the October hearing

Background information from Christian Concern who are supporting the nurses via the CLC.

Please , big girl holey pants, surely?

From TT

SC - comments from CG, Claire Gregory
KD - yes
SC - referring to locker room and indiv CR,
KD - yes
SC - I'm going to explore further with your colleague
KD - yes
SC - you refer to threatening letters from HR, you're the 1st witness so I need to walk you

through the process. If any point you don't know, please just say so.
KD - yes
SC - start of the resolution procedure, are you familiar with this procedure, not going to test you
KD - I only know about this since this has been going on
SC - that's fair

SC - there's an intro, 1st section is intro, then purpose and definition, it's an agreed procedure for resolution of difference, see that
KD - yes
SC - it sets out to resolve differences
KD - is that what recrimination means
SC - no, recrimination means without fear of

consequences
KD - okay
SC - see the bullet points, if you had those concerns this would have been the right forum to resolve them
KD - we did not know about this procedure we thought we were doing the right thing, going through sisters and management

SC - now that you see it, would it have been the right procedure
KD - yes
SC - refers to formal stage
KD - yes
SC - employees have right to accompanied by trade union rep or employee of trust, do you see that
KD - yes
SC - in terms of the process....sorry take out vol 2

Holey big girly pants Batman?

Pause for a cat?!

PAWS no it's a dog!

Or a dog?

From TT

SC - not a letter to you, dated 29 May, 9 days after meeting, letter to ward manager, headed resolution procedure, stage 2, formal, have you seen this
KD - yes, I think I got a copy
SC - says concerns will be dealt with in formal process, stage 2.
SC - now a letter from AS

your solicitors, says 'our clients have declined to engage with the trust resolution procedure', so you didn't intend to engage in the procedure
KD - yes, we did, we gave statements
SC - you did engage, to the extent that you didn't attend interviews,
KD - we did give written

Did counsel just mis- species a cat?!

ETA Aargh I mean a dog. Oh crumbs, it's all so confusing...

He's obviously not fabulous, as he's entered a women's changing room repeatedly. I'm sure we all remember when such behaviour was "frowned upon".

From TT

statements
SC - I'm only pausing because there is a cat on the video, it may be an authorised cat....
J - dealing with the cat
SC - there's the cat, oh it's not a cat, its a dog
J - explaining the various virtual rooms, we can't just remove one person, we'd remove everyone

Are they still unable to shut down participant's video feeds remotely?

Looks like it

The issue is, that if a person is unaware they have their camera on, there might be worse to see than a dog or cat. Hope they manage to contact the person in question

From TT:

KD - I don't mind the dog is cute
J - we don't know what horrors we might yet encounter

From TT

J - lets see if we can carry on,
NF - might we see if we can blank the screen
J - that might be possible
SC - the dog is paying more attention than the person
J - I'm afraid we are going to get things like this, can we try and carry on
KD - I don't mind the dog is cute

J - we don't know what horrors we might yet encounter
SC - lets return to the issue of resolution, you engaged in the hope that the issue might be resolved
KD - yes
SC - your counsel took you to witness statements, 2nd email, 10 Jan, you were asked a number of questions

From TT

SC - you replied that you would take legal advice and then you subsequently responded
KD - yes
SC - you took an active part, whilst receiving legal advice,
KD - yes
SC - you objected to the Trust not allowing your solicitor to attend interviews

From TT

KD - yes
SC but you're saying that the Trust not allowing your solicitor to attend was harassment related to your sex
KD I'm not sure
J repeats and clarifies question - do you understand that you have advanced a legal claim that you have been subjected to harassment by virtue

True unless you have your webcam on.

From TT

of the Trust not allowing you to bring your solicitor, do you understand that is the case you are making
SD I take advice from the legal team
SC and the trust writing to you directly is also harassment
SD yes
SC you were still employed and participating in the i/x

[NB I think TT has labelled KD as SD by mistake]

I would have colour coded the bundles so 1 was green, 2 was yellow, 3 was red etc...

I guess all of these issues stem from a penny-pinching attempt to repurpose a video conferencing system for courtroom broadcast.

If government were serious about Open Justice they would fund a fit for purpose system.

From TT

surely they should be able to write to you
SD - everything should have gone through legal team
SC did you read the outcome letter that was sent to you
SD - yes
SC - none of the complaints against RH were upheld
SD that is correct

SC - heading; intimidation and backlash summer 2024, I'm asking you questions about issues that are before the tribunal, you referred to the encounter in the canteen, I won't ask you about that, it's not before the Tribunal. However, you referred to threats of disc action.

From TT

SC So we need to look at that. This is the letter you refer to,
[bundle faffing]
you say you didn't receive the letter, you were on sick leave, some of the complainants did,
SD - I felt harassed because I was expecting a letter, everyone else got one,

From TT

SC - let's deal with this, RH had raised a g/x - do you accept that it is correct that it should be i/x
KD - yes
SC - your concern or one of your concerns, it says that the i/x conclude that inappropriate behaviour has taken place, there may be disc procedures. Is that what you

I'm reminded of that viral "I'm not a cat judge, honest" background someone had