"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.

Interesting that they would prefer to look wholly incompetent and not 'across' their jobs than to openly say and defend this. It would suggest they don't believe themselves that it's defensible.

There's a new person watching who hasn't muted/switched off their microphone.

I hope we're not about to have a repeat of Fife in February, when some may think there was a deliberate attempt to have remote viewing removed.

Also lurking.
I think I've spent most of the year shaking my head in astonishment at how incredibly awful these people are. I've got Tribunal Watcher's Vertigo
A new medical condition affecting Terfy women.

Isn’t there always when the evidence is starting to go a bit pear-shaped for the TRAs.

I know "we" hate the HR woman but I agree she couldn't win.

She couldn't change the Trust policy on allowing transgender access.

I think the "owner" of that policy is conveniently not a witness?

Oh maybe I take my words back as I saw the "cancer" comment...FFS.

If they had consulted nurses on the policy in the first place or when this all started this would be unnecessary

TA I was unclear what incident had happened. RH had been using CR for years. NF Did you establish what the trigger was
TA Not at that point. Theatre manager said RH had used facilities for 4 years with no complaints/concerns. I had the letter - was trying to draw the two together in my mind.

Earlier, TA spoke about a petition that was going around - presumably re Rose in the CR? as a major negative issue
TA No. This mtg was to discuss concerns of theatre team re use of letter - 'petition' in their words
which sounds a bit Bananarama - they had concerns, but they did the wrong thing by putting around a petition seeking support re their concerns, so management will concentrate on the petition rather than the content of the petition..

What I dislike about TA is, as I've watched her evidence, I've had the feeling that many times she has been obtuse, obstructive, and dishonest.

"RH had been using CR for years"
"Theatre manager said RH had used facilities for four years with no complaints/concerns"

The complaints that didn't exist but were also just 'noise in the system' before and considered 'concerning behaviour' and 'a cancer' and 'harrassment to RH' after?

I think that they know they have fucked up. They are hiding behind policy rather than being true believers.

I was looking for the 'cancer' comment, could find it in TT but I would have added it to my post above about the negative attitude to the nurses raising concerns and seeking support via a petition.

https://x.com/tribunaltweets/status/1983844172462485578

If the 'owner' of the policy retires, wouldn't 'ownership' revert to the Trust? Or really have been theirs anyway as they'd own copyright?

I got you:

TA Concerned c affect of letter on all parties, including DSU colleagues who were upset, on RH and theatre colleagues
NF Behaviour?
TA Taking petition around in a clinical setting was a cancer.
J NF is asking you whose behaviours.
TA The Claimants. It is behaviour taking petition around clinical area and asking ppl to sign it. I was concerned c impact that might have.
NF When first aware of concerns re RH in F CR in 2023. Did you notify Morgan Smith.
TA Aware JB trying to balance conflict situation

The Theatre Manager(s) didn't agree with the nurses concerns at the meeting

(Already released by TT)

Said Rose was a private person who keeps to themselves

Also raised that Rose had been using the CR for 4 years with no complaint.

Tribunal Tweets (@tribunaltweets) | nitter.poast.org
for non X-rs

Oh she is lying through her teeth.

I assumed “cancer” to be a typo or a misunderstanding because it’s such a strange (and somewhat disturbing) thing to say.

"It might happen again, it might not happen again"
"for the managers to assess"
"cool" (did she really say that?)
"needed to be looked into appropriately, within a process"
"I talked about inclusivity and I talked about the resolution process"
"resolution, resolution"
"bring awareness to the wider team"
"we work together as a collective"
"trying to navigate a landscape that was complex"
"to say re educate would not be at my level of pre knowledge"

And time to feed the chooks!

Talk about couldn't win - Sandie Peggie was the first to raise concerns and raised them on her own. "Nobody else has complained, so it's just her being a bigot." These nurses were the first to raise the issue and got together a group of colleagues who shared their views. "Gossip, bullying".

Someone has to raise it first! And either one person who's brave enough to stick their head above the parapet, or a group who discuss it and find they agree. There's no other way for an issue to /be/ raised.

Of course this one is first, if someone else had taken it to tribunal last year we'd be in that tribunal not this one.

Often, this responsibility is recorded in job descriptions. So even if the policy wasn't updated, the chain of responsibility should still have been clear. Don't know if NHS JDs do this.

There is a suggestion that it was Rose stopping meds that triggered the complaints after 4 yrs of perfect harmony.
This was dismissed as gossip previously, I think? but TA repeated it in a meeting:

NF [to docs] July 24 You talk c 15/4 mtg. [reads] Andrew couldn't attend. Concern c impact of petition on RH. Balancing needs of staff. RH had advised
c stopping med to get partner pregnant and this was trigger for concern.
TA I was repeating the concern. That was concern that was raised.
NF What did it mean theatre management staff didn't think this to be accurate.
J Not the witness' notes
[don't know what that comment by J means]

break for 10 mins

Andrew couldn't attend.

I'll just bet he couldn't.

Yesterday she tried to claim it wasn’t anyone’s specific behaviours that she was concerned about and it was more the whole situation and the impact on everyone (but especially Rose ) and this morning thanks to the judge she has had to admit that it was the Cs behaviours that she was referring to.