Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife Health Board and Dr Beth Upton, following Employment Tribunal judgment - thread #61

[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 #60 can be found in this thread: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5379717-sandie-peggie-list-of-threads-covering-employment-tribunal-and-afterwards

Thread 60: mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5461133-sandie-peggie-vs-nhs-fife-health-board-and-dr-beth-upton-following-employment-tribunal-judgment-thread-60 16 December 2025 to 8 January 2026

I'm generously going to assume they mean all women and hope that blokes with a menstruation fetish won't be indulged.

When my former organisation started running them, set up by the women's network, they were for everyone - so men could learn too. I had to argue for additional single-sex versions for women who wanted more private conversations. We did get them, but our EDI officer's first response was 'Oh, I hadn't thought about that!'

It was an interesting article but it skirted around the real issue which is that women who do go to see a doctor about heavy bleeding are so often dismissed and told its normal. I have been lucky but DD started to get really heavy periods when she was 16 and would literally flood though a superplus tampon and a tena pad in the course of a one hour lesson at school. It wasn't until I got her to photograph and date stamp every saturated tampon pad and blood clot and sat there and forced the GP to scroll through them that they even bothered to check her iron levels.

I agree, @Londonmummy66 it took me until the age of 48 to have my incredibly heavy periods taken seriously and I was, finally, diagnosed with fibroids. My periods were almost at an end by that point. Decades of being told it was normal, have some babies, it's your age love.

I'm glad you were able to get help for your daughter but having to photograph tampons and pads is in order to do so, that's outrageous.

Does it make it easier for them to appeal if they can demonstrate that the law was interpreted differently by a different tribunal?

So not on the basis that the other tribunal has authority, but on the basis that there is difference of opinion?

@MarjorieWestriding - it may have been overkill but I was so fed up for her that I went into full - here's the evidence mode. It amused me slightly to see how uncomfortable the GP looked scrolling through it

I am sure they will get permission to appeal. That is, in my view, nailed on. The outcome of the Darlington case makes little or no difference to that. As for whether the appeal will be successful, again the Darlington case isn't really relevant. It may help SP a little, but that is all in my view.

I'm glad to hear the GP was uncomfortable, they should have been. If this is what women and girls have to resort to, GPs will be getting shown a lot more photos of blood soaked tampons and pads.

SPs team can usefully quote Sweeney where they think his approach to a legal issue is persuasive- I think maybe his treatment od H and S Regs in contrast with Kemp's oh, this isn't a criminal court nonsense. EAT free to reject it if not persuaded

It’s especially awful as all these organisations, and the government make this big show of signalling their virtue that the needs of menopausal women are important and that they care, and in these cases this element and women’s experiences of it are just dismissed out of hand because of the whims of men.

So it seems it is ok Kemp didn’t use Ai, instead he was corresponding with an activist colleague who fed him false quotes to use in his judgement…

https://x.com/ewangkennedy/status/2012259041397875082?s=20

I see this is a couple of days old so may have been discussed. I can’t keep up with this thread.

Absolutely crazy. Raises more questions than it answers.

Doesn't make it any better. Regardless of the source, Kemp was responsible for making sure the judgement got the law right and that any quotes from other cases were correct. Did the colleague use AI? And, if this colleague is an activist, why was Kemp seeking advice from them given that it would clearly be biased?

I cannot understand how this ‘colleague’ is not perverting the course of justice. We have to watch what we say during a trial because it may be construed to influence the verdict. But this ‘judicial colleague’ is actively and directly doing that with the actual judge whilst that judge is forming his judgement. And Kemp not only allowed this to happen, he indulged it! How much else of this judgement reflects the opinions of this colleague who was not in court?

A judge consulting with another judge about points of law is acceptable. However, a judge should not discuss a case with another judge who has a personal interest in the outcome.

What other options are there apart from the quotes were hallucinated by AI or made up by somebody who wanted to subvert the judgement in a tribunal?

If they were hallucinated by AI, how is it better if they were found by somebody else and not Kemp?

'Judicial colleague' is a term which could possibly refer to his colleagues on the panel, ie the two lay members. That might explain the extraordinary 'quotes' that no half decent professional lawyer would cite. But a transactivist layperson might.

To correspond with someone outside the proceedings in the course of drafting the judgment and admit to it is probably too bonkers even for Kemp.

I doubt it refers to the well known transactivist lawyers whose names are being bandied about elsewhere. None of them are judges.

I agree it is unlikely to be well known non-judge activists. But activists do not need to be so vocal. Most trans activism is people quietly writing policy or misdirecting others on the law.

I don’t read it as lay members of the panel - I can’t see them referred to as ‘judicial colleagues’ It would also be odd for the only legally trained member of the panel to rely on lay panel members for legal quotes.

There is one TRA ex-judge that I'm aware of.

I don’t understand why they think this explanation is acceptable. It makes it worse!!

I agree it would be stretching the term. And of course a judge shouldn't be relying on the laypeople for the legal stuff. But for a biased /incompetent/lazy/out-of-his-depth-for-whatever-reason judge, I can see how this might happen and how, when asked to explain himself, this wording looks like it provides the best cover.

Foran describing the explanation as 'interesting' says it all really!

Yes, now living in another legal jurisdiction and no longer a judge. And the other two lawyers I can think of aren't and never have been judges.

Even if Kemp did not use AI himself to come up with the "quotes", he is still responsible for the fact they made their way into the judgement. I think rejecting the complaint about Kemp on this basis is wrong. Certainly the EAT won't care where the "quotes" came from. I hope the EAT will criticise Kemp both for the inclusion of these "quotes" and for the misuse of the rules to remove them.