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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

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

1000 replies

nauticant · 09/12/2025 07:55

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

OP posts:
Thread gallery
64
Boiledbeetle · 11/12/2025 13:06

ProfessorofSelfPortraiture · 11/12/2025 12:39

If they do release another version can we have some more squirrels drinking Red Bull, only judicial ones this time?

.

NHS Fife tries to silence nurse - Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton - thread #57
nauticant · 11/12/2025 13:06

New thread will be created shortly. Slight title change to:

Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton, following judgment - thread #58

Any objections?

OP posts:
ArabellaSaurus · 11/12/2025 13:07

nauticant · 11/12/2025 13:06

New thread will be created shortly. Slight title change to:

Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton, following judgment - thread #58

Any objections?

none m'lady.

Do the gavel thing, go on!

ProfessorEmeritaVeraAtkins · 11/12/2025 13:07

Boiledbeetle · 11/12/2025 13:06

.

Oh, how many versions are we going to get?

ArabellaSaurus · 11/12/2025 13:08
Season 5 Episode 20 GIF by The Simpsons

I'd bloody love a wee gavel. Stocking filler?

selffellatingouroborosofhate · 11/12/2025 13:08

ProfessorEmeritaVeraAtkins · 11/12/2025 12:32

they're going to have to do more than put lipstick on this pig.

I want the laugh response back.

You win the thread.

ProfessorEmeritaVeraAtkins · 11/12/2025 13:08

ArabellaSaurus · 11/12/2025 13:07

none m'lady.

Do the gavel thing, go on!

We don't have gavels in UK courts.

ProfLargofesse · 11/12/2025 13:08

ArabellaSaurus · 11/12/2025 13:03

BBC article:

'The amendment is not expected to change the verdict itself. '

It might not change the verdict in their republication of the judgment but I suspect 1000 Miss Marples will be interrogating how the errors informed the judgement, and how erroneous inferences made from incorrect quotes might undermine the arguments being made, with rigour!

But that will be for appeal processes, I would guess, but the rep of the EJ Kemp has taken a big hit by the corrected republication being deemed necessary.

ArabellaSaurus · 11/12/2025 13:08

ProfessorEmeritaVeraAtkins · 11/12/2025 13:08

We don't have gavels in UK courts.

this is the most disappointing thing I've heard in ten years.

EmpressDomesticatednottamed · 11/12/2025 13:08

Vegemiteandhoneyontoast · 11/12/2025 12:44

The part that stayed with me is that if the males try to get back into the hive, the females chew their wings off and kick them out again. A bit grisly, but saves a great deal on winter food bills.

I once went to play in which a character waxed lyrical about how people should follow the example of bees and live as a community. I don't think the writer knew quite what he was on about. Needless to say there was a great stifling of giggles and wondering how it would be if we marched all the men to the village boundary and mounted arm chewing off guards to stop them coming back again.

ILoveLaLaLand · 11/12/2025 13:10

alsoFanOfNaomi · 11/12/2025 12:50

The first part of that is persistent misinformation. There was no doctors' changing room; doctors were expected to use the same changing facilities as the nurses, unless they were consultants in which case they had other options. Upton wasn't a consultant and didn't.

Thank you for the clarification.

Either way, this man should not have been in the female nurses' changing room.
He should have used the male nurses' / doctors' changing room or a single occupancy toilet which is what Maria Kelly had to do. I have never been in a hospital without one of these but anything is possible I suppose.

The female consultants, including his own boss, could also have offered to accommodate his specific desires by offering him the use of their changing room rather than forcing the nurses to put up with his predatory behaviour, seeing as they claim to be trans allies.

A case of do as I say not as I do.

nauticant · 11/12/2025 13:10

I'm soon heading out so the continuation thread has been created shortly before it's actually needed:

www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5458443-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-following-employment-tribunal-judgment-thread-58

OP posts:
GargoylesofBeelzebub · 11/12/2025 13:11

Beerlzebub · 11/12/2025 10:28

Sorry, I haven't RTFT. But I've been doing a bit of fossicking on the Reddit TransUK subreddit and found these comments, from about the only two transes on there who understand legal stuff and aren't just going "Rah rah rah! We won, Peggie lost, TERFs are fewmin!":

Protect-the-dollz
22h ago • Edited 22h ago

Re- 899- that is part of the section labelled 'The employers Dilemma' which outlines the legal problem facing employers.
The actual solution starts in 941 under "Balance Test''. For most of us, this will be by far the most important part of the judgement, because if it becom3s binding law, this is where the test for excluding us is (941-949)
It isn't good for us and we should be extremely wary of promoting Peggie over Kelly.
The judgement is a vindication for Dr Upton, an embarrassment for Forstater and Peggie but the reasoning is extremely problematic.
Finding that allowing a trans person to share a changing room with a terf constitutes harrassment of the terf on the part of an employer would have been considered a landmark defeat for us pre FWS.
It is a horrendous position and I sincerely hope Peggie is not appealed and Kelly instead goes on to be upheld as binding law.
If the reasoning in Peggie was adopted in Kelly Cunningham would have won that case.
That said, Terfs are going absolutely berserk over this and insisting that the judgement was written by AI and contains hallucinated quotes!
Which is great to see. Certainly good for morale watching the meltdown.
Just don't be suckered into the false dichotomy that whatever upsets them is good for us. It isn't a binary.

Protect-the-dollz
21h ago

That said, Terfs are going absolutely berserk over this and insisting that the judgement was written by AI and contains hallucinated quotes!
I regret typing this.
I went to check this, intending to send to a fellow lawyer friend so we could laugh at them together over lunch.
But it is true. Multiple quotes in the judgement are not in the cases they quote.
I didn't see anything that fundamentally underpinned the core of the judgement re us, but I have never seen that before.
Typos, and 'quotations of quotations'- yes, that happens.
But this is weird. I am not going to list each quote I have tested, as I don't want to make the terf's job easier for them, and ad I say, I don't think the false quotes actually make a material difference, but it's weird.

And obviously the following post got downvoted, so it's sort of hidden:

f-class
16h ago

I'm afraid the judgement is so bad, as in, the tribunal has literally made up quotes and interpreted laws so poorly, the entire thing is extremely unsound and will almost certainly be overturned on appeal.
It's either sheer incompetence, prohibited use of AI or some other bizarre agenda.
Unusually, I suspect the judge may face disciplinary action given the highly irregular nature of it, which is relatively rare.
This situation does not help either side - it's going to need to be completely relitigated again, at a higher court, which causes a further issue in that judgements of the higher courts are binding on all other courts below, unlike the original tribunal judgement.
I would strongly recommend remaining neutral on this for now until there's some further announcements.

f-class
15h ago • Edited 15h ago

I'm disappointed that everyone has to go through the whole thing again because a Judge failed to do the basics.
That doesn't help anyone at all.
It isn't a question of being mad - it's simply an appalling judgement for BOTH sides.
It is inevitable that the judgement is going to be significantly revised on appeal - because some of the legal arguments / citations to support some of the conclusions and outcomes are demonstrably AI hallucinations or completely made up. That is just the reality of the shit situation the Judge has put everyone in.
As a legal professional for many decades - this is possibly the worst judgement I have ever seen produced, and NHS Fife's team will be feeling exactly the same. It's not the worst because one side won over another - it's just extremely bad law, downright inaccurate and fails to follow well established legal principles such as precedent.
I am even more disappointed that so many of you in this part of Reddit will feel vindicated and optimistic by this Judgement - when in a few months time, it's almost certainly going to be set aside. That's unacceptable and the judiciary should be held accountable.

f-class
14h ago

I don't think you're getting the sheer gravity of potential judicial misconduct here - it really is something very, very rare. I haven't seen anything like this in a 35 year legal career.
The Judgement is entirely flawed and is not sound whatsoever. Any high street lawyer would recognize this, and therefore won't be doing anything with it until it's been appealed.
This isn't really a question of the facts etc - it's more procedural - the legal processes around constructing and interpreting the precedent judgements referenced within is so bad, its truly dire. A first year law student would do better.
It's like a Judge has just found ChatGPT for the first time without realizing it can make mistakes and hallucinate. I very strongly suspect this Judge will quietly retire after this, it's that bad.

They're part of this thread:

https://www.reddit.com/r/transgenderUK/comments/1pj0dcu/let_there_be_no_doubt_the_sandy_peggie_judgment/

LMFAO. That has cheered me up no end. 😂

ProfessorofSelfPortraiture · 11/12/2025 13:11

Boiledbeetle · 11/12/2025 13:06

.

Yay! Thank you.

MyAmpleSheep · 11/12/2025 13:12

MarieDeGournay · 11/12/2025 12:58

It be argued that even if transpeople ' feel their dignity has been violated by being made to use the toilet of their sex, or the "other circumstances of the case" it is unreasonable to expect employers etc to add fourth spaces, i.e. mixed sex toilets, to existing toilet provision, on the basis that the cost in money and disruption is excessive, given the small number of transgender people in the population.

By way of comparison, there are approx 16m disabled people, and 250,000 disabled people in the UK population.

Employers are obliged under the EA2010 to make 'reasonable adjustments' for disabled people, but only 'reasonable' ones, there are limits.
Putting costly fourth spaces everywhere for such a tiny percentage of the population fails the 'reasonableness' test, in my opinion.

Again, playing devil's advocate: As you say, "putting costly fourth spaces everywhere for such a tiny percentage of the population fails the 'reasonableness' test", so given (as you say, also) the small number of transgender people in the population, isn't it reasonable for women to budge up?

These are questions that deserve clear answers from a court based on the statutory provisions that exist.

MarieDeGournay · 11/12/2025 13:14

FallenSloppyDead2 · 11/12/2025 13:06

Putting costly fourth spaces everywhere for such a tiny percentage of the population fails the 'reasonableness' test, in my opinion.

It does go a long way towards solving a growing political problem though, and may be thought worth it from that pov

You may be right, but isn't that a harsh illustration of the different attitudes to the 250,000 transpeople, and 16m disabled people?
'Reasonableness' limits for the 16m, but 'whatever they ask for, everywhere, regardless of cost' for the 250,000.

Keeptoiletssafe · 11/12/2025 13:15

MarieDeGournay · 11/12/2025 13:05

sorry to quote myself, but I wanted to add this:
Employers are not required to do more than what is considered reasonable
Employers’ duties in protecting disabled people at work: Making reasonable adjustments - HSE

The same 'reasonableness' limit should apply to other protected characteristics, surely.

And also remember part M that talks about the importance of separate-sex toilet washrooms.

Then unisex.

Who would have thought HSE advice is based on sex differences?!?!

usernameinserthere · 11/12/2025 13:15

alsoFanOfNaomi · 11/12/2025 12:57

Place your bets as to when the amended judgement will be issued. I think I'll take 3:10pm, as I think someone may notice that it might be easier to issue it after SP's press conference rather than before.

They would be stupid to reissue it so fast. I’d want to be certain it was accurate down to the last punctuation mark.

Beerlzebub · 11/12/2025 13:16

Especially as it's not the only misquote or made up quote in the judgement.

selffellatingouroborosofhate · 11/12/2025 13:17

ArabellaSaurus · 11/12/2025 13:06

Always worth archiving BBC articles if they contain anything surprising or contentious. They tend to change quite frequently, and almost never record the changes.

Wow, IRL memory holing.

MarieDeGournay · 11/12/2025 13:19

MyAmpleSheep · 11/12/2025 13:12

Again, playing devil's advocate: As you say, "putting costly fourth spaces everywhere for such a tiny percentage of the population fails the 'reasonableness' test", so given (as you say, also) the small number of transgender people in the population, isn't it reasonable for women to budge up?

These are questions that deserve clear answers from a court based on the statutory provisions that exist.

I accept the devil's advocacySmile
isn't it reasonable for women to budge up?
I would argue no, because of the SC judgment - toilets are segregated according to biological sex, and transwomen are biologically male.

WorriedMutha · 11/12/2025 13:20

Wow those Reddit quotes are mind boggling. I'm doing my best with this fast moving thread but I'm playing catch up and haven't seen anyone comment on whether the dodgy quotes have been googled to see if they are actually legit quotes from somewhere? They have just been given the wrong citation? Or is it just ChatGPT on acid.

ProfessorBinturong · 11/12/2025 13:22

I assume we've all saved a copy of judgement v1 for comparison purposes.

Does the reissue affect appeal timelines?

usernameinserthere · 11/12/2025 13:22

WorriedMutha · 11/12/2025 13:20

Wow those Reddit quotes are mind boggling. I'm doing my best with this fast moving thread but I'm playing catch up and haven't seen anyone comment on whether the dodgy quotes have been googled to see if they are actually legit quotes from somewhere? They have just been given the wrong citation? Or is it just ChatGPT on acid.

Seem to be hallucinations or in one case deliberate manipulation of SC wording.

deleting trans from in front of woman deliberate

alsoFanOfNaomi · 11/12/2025 13:26

WorriedMutha · 11/12/2025 13:20

Wow those Reddit quotes are mind boggling. I'm doing my best with this fast moving thread but I'm playing catch up and haven't seen anyone comment on whether the dodgy quotes have been googled to see if they are actually legit quotes from somewhere? They have just been given the wrong citation? Or is it just ChatGPT on acid.

Probably the best thing to read to catch up: https://wingsoverscotland.com/the-valley-of-the-dolls/

The Valley Of The Dolls

The first and most important thing to note about yesterday’s judgment in the Sandie Peggie tribunal is that it’s a very big victory. The tribunal found that Sandie Peggie was gravely an…

https://wingsoverscotland.com/the-valley-of-the-dolls/

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