NHS Fife tries to silence nurse - Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton - thread #57

[nauticant]

Judgment was handed down on 8 December 2025:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6936ce28a6fc97b81e57436a/S_Peggie_v_Fife_Health_Board__Dr_Upton.pdf

Sandie Peggie, a nurse at Victoria Hospital in Kirkcaldy (VH), has brought claims in the employment tribunal against her employer; Fife Health Board (the Board) and another employee, Dr B Upton. Ms Peggie’s claims are of sexual harassment, harassment related to a protected belief, indirect discrimination and victimisation. Dr Upton claims to be a transwoman, that is observed as male at birth but asserting a female gender identity.

The Employment Tribunal hearing started on Monday 3 February 2025 and was expected to last 2 weeks. However, after 2 weeks it was not complete and it adjourned part-heard. It resumed on 16 July and the last day of evidence was 29 July 2025. It resumed again over 1 to 2 September for closing submissions.

The hearing commenced with Sandie Peggie giving evidence. Dr Beth Upton gave evidence from Thursday 6 February to Wednesday 12 February 2025. Sandie Peggie returned to give more evidence on 29 July 2025.

Access to view the second part of the hearing remotely was obtainable by sending an email request to:
[email protected]

The hearing was live tweeted by x.com/tribunaltweets and there's additional information here: tribunaltweets.substack.com/p/peggie-vs-fife-health-board-and-dr-005 and tribunaltweets.substack.com/p/peggie-vs-fife-health-board-and-dr-bd6. This also has threadreaderapp archives of live-tweeting of the sessions of the hearing for those who can't follow on Twitter, for example: archive.ph/WSSjg.

An alternative to Twitter is to use Nitter: nitter.net/tribunaltweets or nitter.poast.org/tribunaltweets

Links to previous threads #1 to #50 can be found in this thread: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5379717-sandie-peggie-list-of-threads-covering-employment-tribunal-and-afterwards

Thread 51: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5402652-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-51 1 September 2025 to 2 September 2025
Thread 52: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5403218-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-52 2 September 2025 to 4 September 2025
Thread 53: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5404208-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-53 3 September to 1 October 2025
Thread 54: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5418690-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-54 28 September 2025 to 21 November 2025
Thread 55: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5447019-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-55 19 November 2025 to 8 December 2025
Thread 56: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5456749-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-56 8 December 2025 to 9 December 2025

I was listening to LBC earlier and heard Tom Swarbrick say that there will be a 1 hour phone in with Webberly tomorrow. I think Tom is brilliant on the subject. Apologies for derailing or if it’s already been mentioned elsewhere!

No problem. I actually came to post it earlier but it was already here. Love Alex Massie!!

I would hope its not referred back down to the ET again as the ET judges are hopelessly incompetent on this matter.
I wonder if Sandie has the strength to take this even higher, as far as it can go, and I hope her financial backer(s) will continue with their support.

The whole 'you can complain' thing also is via a very middle-class and male perspective. Women often have a bad experience of complaining 'she made me do it' she was 'hysterical' and 'nagging' etc. They are far more likely to just self-exclude from jobs that require forced undressing in front of bio males.

Complaining often doesn't go well for women, particularly working class women, as this case amply demonstrates.

e.g. 'Karen'

Could be remote workers perhaps?

or TIF’s

The quote from the SC leaves out quite a large chunk of the legal discussion which muddies the meaning. The SC are setting out why certificated sex doesn’t work and why any objection on the grounds of physical contact doesn’t work.

The Supreme Court were saying that certificated sex doesn’t work because you can’t reasonably say you object to the presence of men except men who have a piece of paper that you aren’t allowed to know about. The same logic applies to physical contact. It is not reasonable to suggest that a coherent objection is based on the presence or absence of a certificate.
“It is fanciful (even perverse) to think that any reasonable objection to the presence of a person of the opposite sex could be grounded in GRC status or that a confidential GRC could make any difference at all. Read fairly and in context, the provisions relating to single-sex services can only be interpreted by reference to biological sex.”
para 218 of FWS

Kemp has completely butchered and misunderstood this section of the SC judgement. It’s a godawful mess with key chunks missing that significantly alter the way it reads.

For a start, the tribunal completely ignores the fact that part of the section they have quoted specifically talks about maintaining the availability of single sex services for women such as changing rooms.

The "reasonableness" bit is referring to a situation where a woman who identifies as a man is excluded from the female facilities despite being of the correct biological sex due to her masculine appearance. This does not mean that there is some test that biological men can pass that allows them access to the women's facilities, which is what this tribunal suggests. It simply means that such men may find themselves excluded from both the men's and women's facilities.

In other words, the SC said it may be reasonable to exclude some people from single sex facilities even though they pass the biological sex test. The tribunal is misusing this to suggest that it means some people can be admitted to single sex facilities despite failing the biological sex test. In my view, this is clearly wrong and contrary to what the SC actually said.

Sandy Kemp is in big trouble if Michael Foran says fabrication allegation is ‘extraordinarily serious’.

I don’t think my mental health can take this so I cannot fathom how Sandie, family and legal team are feeling. How can it be the case that transwomen can have access to female single sex spaces until someone complains? How is that in any way workable? Particularly as they treat women who complain so appallingly.

😬😬😬 im assuming career as judge ended if found out to be true

Take from the strength of Sandie and all the women before her who have the metal and resilience to fight for all of us, it makes me proud and hopeful

Kemp will slope back off to employment practice in minor tribunals. His associates will all be sniggering behind his back as we speak.

💐

The ability to complain also relies heavily on feeling that you have equal human rights, which increasing numbers of women will be resigned to not having.

It's a bit like saying that because we don't hear lots of Afghan women complaining about their treatment in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, that they're fine with it. That they're fine with seeing out of one eye, not speaking, not having an education, or medical care or a job or financial independence. I've not heard any of them complaining recently - Judge Kemp presumably thinks that means they're ok with all this? Silence isn't consent, especially when you know you'll be punished if you do complain.

Plus some things are just wrong and shouldn't require a 'complaint' for it to be seen as wrong.

Mixed sex spaces for trans identified men are a possibility. All the women who consent can use those spaces too.

Thank you very much @ChazsBrilliantAttitude and @prh47bridge.
The more I understand about this judgment, the more absolutely flabbergasted I become. (Also: what is the world become when I, an educated professional, ish, trust some of the anonymous folk on the Internet more than I trust an actual judge?)

Having just ploughed through that long series of disjointed quotations from FWS in para 806 which selectively quotes sections across 10 paragraphs of the FWS judgement (5 pages of detailed legal exposition) I am deeply unsettled by the judicial cherry picking that Kemp engaged in. He has selected and emphasised wording out of context which doesn’t fully and accurately reflect what the SC says. He then uses those selective quotations as the basis for an erroneous interpretation of the judgment.

Did he think people wouldn’t go back to the source material and compare?

It’s pretty bloody awful. This has the potential to be quite serious.

I'd be immediately complaining if he was due to be my Judge. Due to obvious misogyny. I clocked he was a misogynist just from watching proceedings. The wall of sad for example accorded to Upton but not Peggie. The character assassination of Peggie (not relevant to the case whether or not she likes Trump) but not even allowing analysis of Upton's phone regarding the almost certainly fake allegations regarding patient care (very relevant to the case).

I really don't see how he can be allowed to continue.

He's done it for the Greater Good, innit. Brave & Stunning Righteous word-twisting pious fraud Warrior for TRSOH.

It’s compelling.

The BTL comments in The Times re Massie’s piece range from baffled to furious. But the words ‘judicial malpractice’ have appeared.

That's really understandable, I feel like that too quite often tbh

It's really disheartening and quite frightening to see these setbacks play out, but we will claw back our rights like water eroding stone. It shouldn't be like this, but we'll get there again, and hopefully be better armed and with stronger laws for the next time men come for our rights.

how do we know there's a press conference tomorrow (or is it a press statement)? I have not heard or seen this mentioned anywhere else?

Very eloquently put, and it illustrates the double bind women are in. If you complain, then you’re bigoted, shrill and unreasonable and you will be punished. If you don’t complain, then that means you were fine with it.