Employment Tribunal finds NB does not meet PC of GR

[DrProfessorYaffle]

https://www.gov.uk/employment-tribunal-decisions/h-lockwood-v-cheshire-and-wirral-nhs-foundation-trust-and-others-2401211-slash-2024-and-2407178-slash-2024

"Although the claimant has taken steps to change attributes of their sex
from female, by changing their name to a name which can be identified as of
either sex, and has changed their preferred pronouns, those are not in our
view attributes which are for the purpose of moving from one sex to the other,
they are steps in the process of moving away from the female sex to a
different gender identity, ie that of non binary. The claimant is not proposing,
nor do they intend to take any steps to reassign their sex from that of female
to male.
105. We therefore find that the claimant does not have the protected
characteristic of gender reassignment."

Absolutely no idea.

I thought the lisiting of the name change as low urgency, like when people name change after marriage, was a good comparator.

You don't people coming back from honeymoon and filing grievances because their colleagues used the name that was their legal name up until a few weeks ago for eg.

It is low urgency in a health system!

But the problem is that NHS Trans policies have elevated all this stuff and created an expectation of urgency and priority.

The jarring disconnect between these policies and the reality of how these individuals play out their demands in the workplace puts employers in very difficult situations.

Isn't it just! You can see why workplaces just try to placate them & hope they in turn will behave like reasonable adults

newsflash - no accommodation other than total capitulation is ever enough so you may as well just manage them as you would any other underperforming bullying member of staff

Yup, this is my main take-home message!

"The jarring disconnect between these policies and the reality of how these individuals play out their demands in the workplace puts employers in very difficult situations"

Agreed. Part of me is delighted that the NHS, who are so complicit in pushing all this nonsense, are the ones having to deal with the consequences in this case.

That was a fascinating read, what a nightmare heather/haetch would be to work with. I really felt for the individual quoting a patient who had ‘misgendered’ H but was flummoxed because she didn’t know if you should correct the pronouns for the patient or quote them verbatim, what a total nightmare to work with. The staff around her are very long suffering.

I always assumed there were more female NBs than male NBs and for the same reason as @PrettyDamnCosmic but agree there are quite a few male NBs doing what you describe too.

I'm absolutely certain there will also be a few male predators who saw a perfect opportunity open up for them under the guise of a "brave" NB identity too.

Then there's the common garden arsehole, like Eddie Izzard who seems to be doing it for the cool points, career opportunities (although I don't think I've seen him act in anything as Suzie, and it's not like he'd be getting paid the lower wage most actual female actresses get because everyone knows he's really a bloke!), and the extra added bonus that he got to shout at a bunch of teenaged girls for objecting to his presence in a women's toilets once 😡

The woman in this tribunal sounds like a nightmare for everyone, but I find it particularly concerning that patient care came last, and her perceived victimhood eclipsed everything. She's a therapist? 😬

Agree.

I really hope some pennies drop!

I found it interesting that this has been published after NC comments in the SM case about how panels would previously have never come up against this stuff and now....

I had naively assumed that the non-protected status of 'being non-binary' was already established (I was confused by the 'non-binary passport' case!), so this was interesting and welcome news, thank you for posting it.

It's a well-written judgment and positively influenced by FWS (making it, I hope, the first of many). It's crystal clear now that, in law, sex is M or F only, and 'proposing to undergo' in Section 7 means only actions or proposed actions within the specific GRA framework - someone who does not intend to live in an acquired gender which is the opposite of their sex does not qualify.

NBs are still protected from harassment at work as are all of us, and the tribunal considered the harassment claims and rejected them as trivial/accidental/non-malicious/IT glitches etc etc. I can see that the claim could have succeeded if there was persistent gratuitous misuse of name and pronouns, in a way intended to distress, and if the employer did nothing about it. I think that opens up a different angle on the topic (enforced speech, protected belief etc), so will save for another post...

Got to para 57

They explained that being misgendered was “like a gong going off in their head” and that was why they couldn’t mention it in the conversation. The claimant then proceeded to put paper across all but a few inches of the glass panel between the claimant’s and Ms Dunn’s room. Although the claimant says they did this because they felt unsafe, we are unclear what the claimant means by this.

Unfortunately, there is no way of double bolding the final phrase - nice turn of phrase from the panel

They expand on this later:

111. Firstly, we do not find that the claimant has shown facts from which we
could conclude that any of the incidents had the effect of violating their dignity.
Violating is a strong word. Offending against dignity or hurting is not enough.
The claimant has suggested that they felt “unsafe”. They have not shown
what they mean by this, and we found no evidence of the conduct having that
effect. Much of their evidence about the effect of the conduct upon them upon
them is vague and imprecise. Although we do not dispute the offence, distress
and frustrations that these issues have had upon the claimant, we find that
viewed objectively the claimant has not shown facts from which we could
conclude that the conduct violated the claimant’s dignity.

The judge notes that the judge and lawyers on both sides all misgendered the claimant during the case - all apologised and the claimant said they were not offended.

Do newly married or divorced women regularly get hugely upset if someone gets their surname wrong? It must cause distress if you're just out of an awful marriage, changed your name and people keep calling you by your abusive ex's name

Seems like the violation of dignity is all in H's head, like the pronouns and the NB identity. Why should everyone else have to join in H's game?

I think the wider definition of 'trans' does include non-binary and other gender identites, at least from the point of view of the last census. However, this seems to confirm that not all trans people have the PC of gender reassignment.

NBs are still protected from harassment at work as are all of us

Is this in the same sense that any kind of bullying could be the subject of a tribunal?

It’s so encouraging to read these judgements. They are models of clarity, common sense and also compassion.

Is this in the same sense that any kind of bullying could be the subject of a tribunal?

Yes, employers are not supposed to expose their employees to a hostile or degrading environment.

Interestingly patient care came a long way last for her as a hcp, but when she was the patient she felt it should come first, before actual safety..

The claimant has been unable to identify who spoke to them that day, but
says that the nurse read the form and stated “OK so she is here for both a flu
and vaccination clinic.” Neither of the nurses are individual respondents.
45.The claimant was distressed by the incident. They did not correct the nurse
at the time, and considered that this was not a minor oversight, as they
considered that the nurse should have spotted their non binary status. The
form did not identify what pronouns the claimant preferred. The claimant
reported the incident to their line manager....
47.Further that the practice of the staff was to focus upon reading those parts of
the form which were clinically relevant to ensure safe and effective
administration of the vaccine. This had resulted in the gender field on the form
not being properly acknowledged. Patient safety and effectiveness were
given priority over patient experience. That the misgendering was not
intentional and that both nurses acknowledged the distress caused and had
both offered to make a full apology."

You know the sound a cat makes when it's trying to cough up a furball? I think it's pronounced like that.

Oh, you're right, that makes more sense

Getting this case to tribunal must have cost a lot. Is it clear how H got their funding?

Thank you @DrProfessorYaffle

"Patient safety and effectiveness were given priority over patient experience."

This is one of the things I find so frightening about GI, the people who adhere to the ideology, and "trans medical care" in general. People seem to completely lose their senses and are willing to harm, or allow themselves to be harmed for a temporary feeling of validation. It's just so stupid, and so so dangerous!

I wondered that.

Would be relevant to the potential for appeal too.

It’s hard the believe that this person has described a couple of misgenderings as making them feel ‘unsafe’ when the staff of the NHS are routinely facing actually physical violence.
C: misgendering is literal violence
J: no it’s not.

Yes, whether a HCP is a random blue hair or fully fledged GRC holder, their patients, and their own HCPs, need to know their actual sex, for valid practical reasons.

I was imagining it might rhyme with "ache" maybe?? As in "headache for all concerned"

I think changing your name, in adulthood, to one that no one will know how to spell or pronounce, is in itself a power thing.

To add to that confusion that you will file a grievance against those who do not use it consistently and confidently or who accidentally use your old (well known, routinely spelled and pronounced) name.

You just come across as an arse.