"Darlington Nurses" vs County Durham and Darlington NHS Trust Tribunal Thread 4

[ThreeWordHarpy]

Thread 1, 7-Oct to 23-Oct; pre-hearing discussion, KD (day 1 of evidence) and BH (day 2).
Thread 2, 23-Oct to 28-Oct; BH (day 2), CH, JP, MG (day 3&4), TH, SS, ST, LL (day 4), JS, AT (day 5)
Thread 3, 28-Oct to 29-Oct, AT (day 5&6), TA (day 6)

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. The hearing started on October 20th, with evidence starting on October 22nd and is scheduled to last 3 weeks. To view the hearing online requests for access had to be made by October 17th. The hearing is being live tweeted by Tribunal Tweets who have background to this case on their substack. An alternative to X is to use Nitter: nitter.net/tribunaltweets or nitter.poast.org/tribunaltweets

The Judge made clear at the start of the public hearing on Day 1 that only TT or press have permission to tweet. If online observers see/hear something in the court that isn’t reported by TT, we don’t mention it until the next time there’s a break. This is a very cautious approach to avoid any accusations of “live reporting” on MN. Commentary on the content of TT tweets is fine as soon as they’re posted on X.

Key people:
C/Ns - Claimants, the Darlington nurses
R/T/Trust - Respondent, County Durham and Darlington NHS Foundation Trust
J/EJ – Judge/Employment Judge Seamus Sweeney
NF - Niazi Fetto KC, barrister for claimants
SC - Simon Cheetham, KC, barrister for respondents
RH - Rose Henderson, trans identifying nurse
CG – Clare Gregory, ward manager
SW - Sue Williams, NHS Trust HR
KD – Karen Danson, first claimant to give evidence.
BH – Bethany Hutchison, claimant
AH – Alistair Hutchison, husband of Bethany
CH – Carly Hoy, claimant
JP – Jane Peveller, claimant
MG – Mary Anne (aka Annice) Grundy, claimant
TH – Tracy Hooper, claimant
SS – Siobhan Sinclair, witness for the claimants, retired from Trust
ST – Sharron Trevarrow, witness for the claimants, retired from Trust, former housekeeper and wellbeing officer
LL – Lisa Lockey, claimant
JP – Professor Jo Phoenix, expert witness
JS – Jane Shields, witness for the claimants
AT - Andrew Thacker, witness for the respondents, NHS trust Head of HR
TA – Tracy Atkinson, witness for the respondents, NHS trust HR.

You wonder how many women they would have been prepared to fuck up the lives of rather than inconvenience one obviously v v special bloke.

The idea of course is punish into submission. Eventually it'll be so difficult you'll just shut up and get your tits out for him.

Comment of the day!

Do we know yet if and when Rose will make an appearance?

She has been very confident as a witness. No crimson blushes. No sideways glances. Even some answering back at times, pugnaciously. Where does this confidence sprout from?

The H&S 1992 regs cover all of the following:

4A.Stability and solidity
5.Maintenance of workplace, and of equipment, devices and systems
6.Ventilation
7.Temperature in indoor workplaces
8.Lighting
9.Cleanliness and waste materials
10.Room dimensions and space
11.Workstations and seating
12.Condition of floors and traffic routes
13.Falls or falling objects
14.Windows, and transparent or translucent doors, gates and walls
15.Windows, skylights and ventilators
16.Ability to clean windows etc. safely
17.Organisation etc. of traffic routes
18.Doors and gates
19.Escalators and moving walkways
20.Sanitary conveniences
21.Washing facilities
22.Drinking water
23.Accommodation for clothing
24.Facilities for changing clothing
25.Facilities for rest and to eat meals
25A.Disabled persons

Can we assume that this NHS trust is unaware of all of this?

She has channelled the confidence of a mediocre man

Gawd knows - it's very misplaced!

Andy Thacker must be so proud of his protege.

😂😂😂

Ahh, JB made clear that in her view if a person with the characteristic of gender assignment asks for something to do with "gender", then any refusal is discrimination against them according to their gender assignment characterstic.

Is it me or is it the case that the more intelligent, middle class or senior a person is the more they are allowed to rely on their own wilful ignorance of the law as an open and shut case justifying why they should not be held accountable.

Take a homeless crackhead and I am sure "ignorance of the law is no defence" would apply 100% when they drop a cigarette butt or open a can of stella in a public no drink zone int he town centre.

She is astonishing.

But they didn't ask for anything to do with their gender - RH asked for access to sex based spaces for the sex he is not.

It's a gender thing. So must be permitted. The law says so.

My taxes are sitting in a corner, rocking, with their hands over their ears, at the thought that they are paying for so many ignorant, stupid people to do nothing or - worse - screw up the work environment for so many others.

NHS HR and EDI staff

Is she perhaps just not lying or covering things up? Im not watching, but from the tweets it sounds like she’s being very open about what happened.

In my view, this. Quite a sensible approach.

I have to say I do have a smidge of sympathy for this lady. The EA wasn't clear and we had plenty of debates on here about its exact meaning and how it interacted with the GRA and what it meant for single-sex provision. There was also so much misinformation floating around including from Government, EHRC, Stonewall, NHSE etc. and at the time the toxic nature of things meant that anyone who wanted to keep their job would have pandered to a single male trans person over women.

Isn't it always the way? No one wants to say no to TW exactly because they know they are men. He might get angry, he might threaten. violence, he might loom over people and thump desks whereas actual women are very unlikely to do any of these scary things do can be ignored

TLDR everyone knows a thwarted man might get very angry very quickly

I do get the impression she is not trying to deceive.

I missed some of it. Is she the person who said the claimants were exaggerating?

Not to mention often have a large bunch of unhinged friends with no conscience, a lot of time on their hands and a capacity for bombarding with emails, calls, tweets, badnaming and threatening, identifying your family and kids, and the police are as captured as everyone else.

I don’t think she is being completely open and honest.

But I also think she could give the density of mince a run for its money.

That would be Stonewall law, right? Which is better than boring old legal law because it can be whatever they want it to be.