Tempest v Rural Payments Agency Tribunal Thread 6

[myladydisdainisyetliving]

Previous thread: www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5549959-tempest-v-rural-payments-agency-tribunal-thread-5

TT substack: tribunaltweets.substack.com/p/tempest-vs-defra-and-rural-payments

Tempest (a TW) is claiming discrimination, harassment and/or victimisation on grounds of gender reassignment. Central to the claim is the existence of the Sex Equality and Equity Network in the Civil Service (SEEN). SEEN has been granted right to intervene. Parts of the original claim against the co-chair of SEEN (Elspeth Duemmer-Wrigley) and another party (Andreas Mueller) were struck out or narrowed. Another claimant, PQ, is no longer part of the case.

Please note that Elspeth still has a garden in need of seeds and water to support the ability of SEEN to be an intervenor in this case. The claim originated because she said "only women menstruate" and a search with her name and those terms at the usual gardening website should point you to her plot.

I kinda disagree as per my earlier analysis. I think he thinks her input will make it difficult for
him to present a clear judgment because he will have to consider points she is raising. I think he is very focussed already on what his judgment will say and her interventions are complicating it for him. I don’t think it’s personal.

If she asserts that C demonises SEEN he’s going to have to address that in his judgment and he’s already pretty convinced no hot potatoes are needed - in my view. If she uses more passive vocabulary he can skim over it.

I may change my mind tomorrow!

"Demonises"? @ProfLargofesse
Tsk.
Watch your language, pretty please. We don't use those kinds of words around here - or at least, no one on the GC side of things is allowed to.

My thoughts exactly - who would dare?

Suddenly I wish to go back to gainful employment. Specifically to work in his department.

I read this out to young DD. Poor thing has a long history of listening to me read stuff out about tribunals and/or comments from funny, wise women/bonkers TRAs.

For you, she suggested that if you're bored, instead of setting fire to your hair, you could learn some K-pop choreography

Mine too. Why dont they ever ask the tough Qs?

Agree. From the start, Ive felt his clear dislike of NC has come across every time she's in front of him. It's so pointed and obvious that I can only assume he's forgotten that TT are recording his behaviour.

Back to basics, but is it seriously the case that the Civil Service looked at Twitter and said ‘waheeeee! So positive! So helpful! We must have our own in the workplace! It shall be called Yammer and people will have really great conversations on it!’

Talking of recording behaviour, do you think Tink might be reading this and having an attack of the vapours all over again? I actually feel quite sorry for him being such a victim yet a thug, but then I remember my lovely colleagues who just do not deserve to be put in this position, second guessing everything they say and do, and my pity transforms into anger.

HH - You say you need to take a neutral balanced approach to the situation. I suggest JH who was the 1st person to look at the matter to look independently with fresh pair of eyes?

I suggest you are talking out if your arse, hen.

sorry I know I am hours and hours behind but of all the utter drivel and hyperbolic 🐂 that has been sanctimoniously thrown out this one could not be ignored.

Independent and fresh eyes are different to neutral and balanced.

NB said (correctly) there was a need for a neutral and balanced approach.

HH came back with the suggestion that JH was independent and had fresh eyes. That may be true, she was arguably independent and had fresh eyes, but she wasn't neutral, and she wasn't balanced.

Absolutely yes - 👋 heya Tinkerbell. I don’t believe in fairies 🧚 or that hulking men can be women no matter what the wear. Or indeed any men.

And Emma love - sorry for your DSD but reclaiming your truth as intersexy and enabling these donkeys 🫏 doesn’t give you a MANdate to terrorize women.

HH you were aware that trans staff were expressing feelings of nausea, anxiety, shame, feeling unsafe

So HH can use this language but NC can’t use the word demonise?

So as far as I can see, HH is deeply into BDSM, Necrophilia and Bestiality. How else can anyone explain her desire to flog a dead horse?

I posted on the previous thread the problem isn't transphobia, it's GC-phobia. This is the NHS page on phobias

https://www.nhs.uk/mental-health/conditions/phobias/

If these folx are being honest () they need therapy. It's not SEEN, it's they/them.

Blimey…….well at least there is one grown up HR rep in the public sector.

Did I understand correctly- the judge forgot NC would be questioning the witness? Even though presumably NC is sat right there with the others?

You’rs do right.
I work in L&D and for years the prevailing theory has been “if we make our learning and comms platforms like the social media platforms people use in their spare time, people will love using them and that will solve all our learning and comms issues”. (The number of times I’ve heard the phrase “we need to make this platform “the Netflix of learning” is ridiculous).

But what you dnd up getting is a watered-down crappy version of Facebook/ Twitter/ Netflix. The corporate version doesn’t have the billions of investment, so is missing key functionality and the highly-tuned algorithms to personalise the content to your specific and unique job.

Anyway don’t worry. AI is coming to save us /s

I assumed that the quick discussion between HH and ST outside was ST confirming that he’d had complaints previously. Therefore HH dropped that line of questioning sharpish?!

I would go further and say he was probs disciplined

Having finally caught up with today, I got the impression that the judge was losing patience with HH's line of questioning early on, but still let her go around in circles far too much. Getting snitty about NC's use of the word demonise was a bit weird given that context.

The horse has also bolted so she's probably also into necromancy.

So supposing the judge finds that parts of the process were unfair to ST, what then? I am still not clear what the range of outcomes might be?

What ST wants is that the judge finds the existence of SEEN is harassment. Obviously if that was a finding, then Defra may consider disbanding them. But it seems massively unlikely that the judge will find that.

ST still has a job. And has had no financial loss because periods of absence were on full pay. So no financial detriment.

So if the judge finds, for example, that the issuance of JH’s letter led to false hopes for ST and that was a fault by DEFRA - what then? They just commit to improve process?

The ultimate aim of this tribunal does seem to be to have SEEN disbanded and to silence GC voices at work. If ST wins part of the claim related to the grievance process but the tribunal finds that the grievance outcome was reasonable (that Defra was correct to allow SEEN to exist) then ST and his backers won't be happy.

So supposing the judge finds that parts of the process were unfair to ST, what then? I am still not clear what the range of outcomes might be?

IANAL but I don't think the judge is looking at the fairness of the process, they are looking at whether it was discriminatory.

So if everyone has the same process and times scales it cannot be direct discrimination even if the process is fair.

They could try to argue indirect discrimination that the process specifically impacted ST more because they are so vulnerable, but many people taking out grievances are vulnerable.

They could try to argue that allowing the existence / accessibility of SEEN was harassment (I think this is what they are arguing), and this is where they potentially do have more of a claim.

Edited to add because I just looked up the legislation: In terms of harassment the judge needs to look at the perception of ST, did they genuinely feel harassed (yes), the other circumstances of the case, and whether it was reasonable for the "conduct" to be perceived as harassment.