Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton, following Employment Tribunal judgment - thread #60

[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), 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.
Following handing down of the judgment on 8 December 2025, on 11 December 2025, it was announced by Sandie Peggie and her legal team that they would be pursuing an appeal.

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.

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 2025 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
Thread 57: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5457132-nhs-fife-tries-to-silence-nurse-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-thread-57 9 December 2025 to 11 December 2025
Thread 58: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5458443-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-following-employment-tribunal-judgment-thread-58 11 December 2025 to 12 December 2025
Thread 59: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5459115-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-following-employment-tribunal-judgment-thread-59 12 December 2025 to 17 December 2025

And Beira’s place doesn’t take donations (I asked!) - presumably to maintain independence.

I’m pretty sure that Glasgow rape crisis centre broke away from Rape crisis Scotland because they didn’t want to allow transwomen in their female only services.

Just returning to Gethin Chamberlain. I thought his thread was extremely good, and I find it amazing that there appear to be no consequences for the judge and, by extension, the judgement itself. We know that the judgement contained fictitious quotes and numerous errors of law that were fairly obvious to a well-informed lay person. In most professions, there would be consequences for this - the journalist Johann Hari lost his job, not for making up quotes, but for copying quotes from other articles.

It seems unbelievable that a judge could do this without getting disciplined, and without the judgement itself being canned in favour of new hearing with a different judge.

The EAT will decide if the judgement is canned in favour of a new hearing with a different tribunal. No-one else can make that decision.

It is unlikely we will find out if the judge is disciplined in any way. Even if he is, it is unlikely to happen until after the EAT.

This is a week old now but popped up in my youtube feed and I just enjoy the Black Belt Barrister's incredulous tone about the ET decision.

Why would JKR talk about it if she is funding Sandie? It's no-one else's business. Perhaps she, like me, was brought up to believe that good deeds should be kept private. Certainly she has never said much about how much she gives to Beiras place or to Lumos. Other people have made that public, JKR doesnt go on about it.

I've enjoyed reading so many reactions from non activist lawyers looking at the judgment with incredulity.

The law mainly applies to the little people and less and less to anyone further up the line. If it were applied equally, there would be a lot of wealthy people behind bars.

Agree. Also, JR was clearly fishing to find out who is funding SP's case, and it seems likely that any attempts to expose the funder now would almost certainly be used as a distraction from the critical issues around the faulty legal judgment.

A working class nurse has the means to appeal a grave injustice, and that's excellent news for Sandie, and excellent news for us all in that it should put the wind up any organisation that they can no longer rely on systemic injustice to cover over bad behaviour.

I loved the interview snippet with Sandie linked above! She was looking and sounding great! I am so glad that this Christmas Eve will be likely be overshadowed by impending legal action not for her, but for every f*cker who betrayed her.

Well, apart from the fact that she is known to have donated to the For Women Scotland Case.

And the fact that she has set up the JK Rowling Women's fund to support women fighting legal cases (https://jkrwf.org/).

Oh, and the fact that earlier this year she gave a whole interview to the Sunday Times about the money she was donating to good causes:

https://www.thetimes.com/sunday-times-rich-list/feature/article/jk-rowling-interview-2025-philanthropy-wk6hhcfc0

But yeah, apart from that, she probably doesn't like to talk about it.

If she is funding SP then the terms of that arrangement would have been made before she announced the JKR Women's Fund.That fund established late 2024 and announced early 2025 is a formally established organisation managed by trustees/staff and will have its own terms and conditions around disclosure.

We simply can't know either way who is funding SP unless SP and/or the people involved in that specific contract want and are permitted to disclose their private business under the terms agreed back in early 2024.

Sandie obviously has a lot going on and is talking about the things that matter to her the most right now

Thank you!

But also, BoswellToday turned me into a distrustful AI-suspicious hag. So can I ask does anyone who follows Gethin Chamberlain know if he usually writes in that style?

Edit apologies I see he is a legit journalist!

I believe that where JKR has been involved in funding a case, she has only talked about that after the case has concluded, to avoid distraction from the legal issues.

I hope she can put a few bob Sall Grover’s way, bless her. She still needs $400k for her appeal.

When is Sall's appeal judgement due? I'd thought it was expected before Christmas.

@OhBuggerandArse It won’t be until February at the earliest. The Court is on holidays now until February. Sall wrote about it on Twitter and was very disappointed about having to continue to wait.

@RoyalCorgi JKR has been giving money away for many years without talking about it. Maybe she did this one interview in very many years because she was on the Sunday Times Rich list to encourage other people on the list to do the same.

You cant set up a fund to help women without a minimum of publicity to reach the women who might need it. Lots of women donated to FWS, obviously that upsets you.

Still none of your business what someone else does with their money.

I didn't say it was any of my business. What I wrote was: "Also mildly curious about who's funding Sandie's case - I think we've always assumed it's JKR, but there's no reason for her (JKR) not to be open about it."

That's it.That's what I wrote. "Mildly curious." For some reason you decided to get on your high horse about it, and claimed she thought good deeds should be kept private. When I pointed out that that clearly wasn't the case because she'd spoken about it publicly, you decide this doesn't count because - well, because you can't bear to gracefully admit that you were wrong.

I suspect you're one of those people who would start a fight in an empty room.

Glasgow and Clyde Rape Crisis?

@RoyalCorgi You have been quite clear than you have an unhealthy interest in this, a lot more than "mildly curious". I said "perhaps" she was brought up to believe good deeds should be private. JKR has done ONE interview after saying nothing for 24 years. So no, I'm not wrong. She doesnt generally make a big deal of her charitable works and one interview in 21 years and minimal publicity for a fund to help women - that is zero use if no-one knows about it - does not change that.

You've had it pointed out to you that there are reasons why she might choose to keep quiet but your curiosity is apparently more important. I'm not "on my high horse" but you certainly hate anyone questioning why you cant have what you want.

I am very sorry to read these posts and also sorry that I might have started the derail. Recent experience with my late mum still very raw and does make me query whether "best interests" is actually "we know best". Whilst not giving a fig about the person. And knowing nothing about them. Anyway again sorry on all those fronts.

What a brave woman to stand up to so many in positions of power, just because she didn't want a peeping Tom/flasher in the changing room with her.

Not that long ago he would have been arrested and charged with indecency and rightly so. The men who start off as peeping Toms and flashers graduate to rapists given enough time and opportunity. These are not harmless activities, just the first phase in deviant behaviour, as we have seen with Wayne Couzens.

I'm assuming because JKR wants to keep her track record that 100% of the cases she has funded have been successful. Not out of ego, but to avoid handing an argument against her very powerful voice to TRAs.
She's been open about funding FFS, Roz Adams and Julie Binge IIRC.

Not that long ago he would have been arrested and charged with indecency and rightly so.

Just be being in the female facilities. And when Upton told whoever it was that he would be use the women's changing room, the answer would have been a most definite No, you will not.

Yes. And women would have felt confident enough to say "there's a flasher / a voyeur in the women's changing room".
Instead employers like the NHS sanction women for pointing out these men 😡