"Darlington Nurses" vs County Durham and Darlington NHS Trust Tribunal Thread 8

[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&7)
Thread 4, 29-Oct to 31-Oct; TA, AM (day 7) JB (day 8)
Thread 5, 31-Oct to 04-Nov; JB (day 8), SW, CG, JR (day 9)
Thread 6, 04-Nov to 05-Nov; RH (day 10), SW (day 11)
Thread 7, 05-Nov to 11-Nov; SW (day 11), closing submissions

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 now complete. Submissions are being made on November 11th. 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, NHS 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, NHS trust Head of HR
TA – Tracy Atkinson, NHS trust HR.
AM – Andrew Moore, NHS Head of Workforce Experience
JB – Jillian Bailey, NHS Workforce Experience Manager
AT – Anna Telfer, NHS Deputy Director of Nursing
SW – Sandra Watson, Matron for General and Elective Surgery
JR – Jodie Robinson, manager of Rose

I am old, i have noticed in life that managers breed more managers and would sooner cut front line jobs, that define the very existence of a service, than their own job.

So as i have seen, a “head of service” maintain their post until they had no staff to be head of service of.

in local authorities it is service reviews upon service review moving or merging departments from one place to another.

it is dog eat dog fighting over the carcass of the remnants of a budget. Run off like a wolf with the spoils of sucking up and politicking to justify their own existence.

No reference is had to where the money should or ought to be spent or what front line services should look like or be because that is not their job.

Too many managers doesn’t work. Even in the small company I work in we have a ratio of leaders/ manager to non manager staff of less than 1: 2. It breeds a weird feeling in the workplace and stifles everything. In a huge organisation like a hospital I imagine it brings a whole host of other problems.

Fundamentally though, no matter how you cut it, a top heavy organisation spends large amounts of their money on people not actually doing the job of that business. Which makes it wasteful.

I asked him if he'd read the article "Bullshit Jobs" and he said he read it and liked it so much he bought the book (and keeps it prominently displayed).

Thank you - I had never heard of that article and book!

For anyone else like me, this page includes the Book Contents list, Preface and the original article:

theanarchistlibrary.org/library/david-graeber-bullshit-jobs

I used to know someone who is an NHS manager. She said that invariably people thought that her job was parasitic and unnecessary, whereas the reality was that no one had any idea of the huge amount of work it takes to organise the supply chains, the transport, the staff, to maintain the infrastructure and to organise the services that look after these. I’d be interested to know if there have been studies comparing the NHS supply and management with comparable services in the military

I wonder if it'll end up being like the football manager merry-go-round.

You're probably also someone who could carry out Equality Impact Assessments properly in your sleep. They are few and far between, as @KnottyAuty and @TwoLoonsandaSprout's audit of NHS trusts showed. I think in the eventual shakedown the public sector is going to need people with your type of skills.

There's a Head of Transformation (I actually think it's interim director if I'm splitting hairs) at my work. As far as I can discern he basically goes around talking to teams about the potential changes that will take place to team structures in the next 6 months and then 6 months later is back again to tell us that no changes have yet happened but they DEFINITELY will in 6 months time. I'm kind of weirdly fascinated by the randomness of it as he gets paid a hell of a lot more than me and I actually do stuff in my role! There's a lot of jobs like this though in my organisation. We also have an equality team full of 'Isla Bumbas'. You've got to admire the sheer brass neck of it all I suppose...

Came across this article in the Telegraph regarding the nurse Jennifer Melle

https://archive.ph/ClkdW

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/12/01/nurse-suspended-trans-peadophile-mr-ehrc/

What an absolute disgrace, how much is this going to cost the taxpayer and think of the long term effect this will have on the nurse.

Her union and the RCN haven't covered themselves with glory in these cases.

Woman declared dead at home after she collapsed making toast woke up alive in the mortuary, inquest hears | Daily Mail Online

Can't tell the difference between males and females? Can't tell the difference between dead and alive?

Does Darlington have a problem with checking whether they are hiring medically trained staff or something?

It’s really disconcerting when this is my local NHS Trust!

Don't know who made the decision, but it is a medical aphorism that no hypothermic person should be declared dead until their body temperature has been raised to normal, along with intensive emergency treatment.

"You're not dead til you're warm and dead" is regularly chanted at medical dramas in this house.

Thank you for that insight into your home life, your family sounds surprisingly well informed..
😁

Aye my daughter was horrified at me saying this to her the other day. I can't remember what made me think of it but it suddenly seemed very important info to impart.

This is a massive sum awarded to the claimant from the Trust

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6928326a9c1eda2cdf0341a3/Mr_F_Qureshi_v_County_Durham_and_Darlington_NHS_Foundayion_Trust_2501333-2024_Judgment.pdf

Tracy Atkinson gets a named spot in the judgement....

I'm picturing a family that does a loving and wholesome post mortem on all its hamsters before sending them to their final shoe box.

Um.

Mostly goldfish rather than hamsters, but yes.

Isn’t it meant to be cold and dead?

No - it’s a healthcare saying. Extreme hypothermia can make it harder to find signs of life, and people who have been rescued from cold water have been known to survive despite not having an easily detectable pulse or signs of breathing.

Resuscitation involves warming people to a normal temperature to be sure, so yes, you’re not dead until you’re warm and dead.

In the recent budget there was a downgrade to productivity forecasts. This stems from falling productivity in the public sector , particularly the NHS which continues to receive increased funding to produce reduced outputs. Poor management is the reason.

If at any one time half the management team is sitting in a tribunal somewhere, it's hardly surprising productivity is low.

In some cases, it might cause a striking improvement.