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.

Question for our legal experts.

Normally an appeal considers only points of law and process, and doesn't rehear witnesses. What happens if the appeal is on the failure to hear a witness in the first case?

Not a legal expert but I think I know this one: one of the options for the EAT is to order a re-hearing at a new ET. I think that would then be a full re-hearing of everything, so here's hoping that's not what happens in this case!

While I'm here: I can c&p the first session today, but that's all (need to leave before 12 and then will be out all day).

We probably need a separate thread to discuss the appointment of Ruth Hunt as a Civil Service Commissioner, but this tweet points out the relevance to the DEFRA case. https://x.com/WRNNorfolk/status/2074554242199638376

For information, Yammer is a Microsoft product that acts like Facebook across an organisation. I worked at a university that had it.

Microsoft have renamed it Viva Engage. The Civil Service didn’t invent it or just buy it in as it’s part of the Microsoft suite of products like Word, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint etc.

It seems like a lot of court time for a staff networks messages.

was anyone doing any actual work at DEFRA?

Placemarking because you are all to quick and MN is incredibly slow with refreshing and losing my place.

Thank you to everyone posting!

Blimey, have just read yesterday thread from yesterday afternoon in a oner. Was fucksakin' away in double time. HH was painful in her questioning. NC was to the point (probably under J's scrutiny and pressure which was strangely lacking when it came to HH's questioning tactics).

Who's up today?

Thanks to all the c&p's and the running commentary.

So true. And there has rarely been a beacon of a project that can take on the big players that people willingly use that lasts 5 minutes, so, all change again within a few years.

I don't think that was hurrying her along. She knows he likes to finish on a natural break and not carry a line of questioning over to the next day, so was warning him that if she started now it would carry over. He acknowledged that it would go longer but wanted to make a start rather than waste the remaining time bit of the afternoon session by stopping early.

Thank you so much for all the C&P yesterday was excruciating to read I can’t imagine how you got through it without giving up!

@fanOfBen @myladydisdainisyetliving I can C&P the second part of the morning but I'm out after lunch so will not be able to do the afternoon.

Even in the extraordinary Sandie Peggie judgment, the judge said Upton and Peggie shld have been kept apart once Sandie complained and until a proper solution cld be kept in place (I think this was the period during which he accepted there was harassment.) So I do think that until SEEN/yammer got the moderation/restricted access sorted (and not while it was a work in progress), it is likely that the judge will rule there was harassment.

Defra/Cabinet Office seem to have decided that the way to adapt post Forstater was to allow SEEN because they allowed the LGBT+ networks and the decision makers are not in the weeds of all this and had no idea how vitriolic, extreme and uncontrolled TRA voices were against GCs. They should have realised that there was no way the 2 sides cld be allowed to voice their views in a free for all (however relatively restrained we may feel “our” side’s posts were.) It was never going to be possible to allow these diametrically opposed forums in the workplace.

The harder decision post Forstater was to stop all these non-work related/belief forums. They were weak and took the easier route because “we’re all adults” and there’s a code of conduct etc.

JH f*ed up - deliberately or otherwise - with her grievance outcome letter. It created false expectations and it was reasonable for ST to expect the recommendations to be carried out. As she was a DEFRA employee, DEFRA will have to pay up for that.

I have a bad feeling about this case and I don’t see how it is going to produce any sort of win for SEEN. (I hope I’m wrong!)

May be able to do the afternoon up until 3pm. I am feeling much better today. I will be able to give advanced notice if that changes though.

Ah, I see your point, and think I stand corrected. Then I was unfair to Judge, and misunderstood what he meant on that time issue. Wanted her to start so as to not waste the time.

Did ST want suspensions for what he viewed as transgressive behaviour? If so, I’m sure DEFRA et al could have suspended the transgressors posting vitriol on SEEN statement. The vitriol seems to have been significant, yet the post itself was taken down. Considering the post was considered and moderate, it is interesting those posting the vitriol were not the one’s who were punished/suspended/warned/advised.

From TT:

^The employment tribunal of Tempest v DEFRA & RPA continues this morning, 8 July. Start time, expected not before 10 am. This is the first morning session. t.co/ddI1tTND87^

Our previous reporting, background information on the case, witness statements (after witnesses are sworn), opening notes from counsel and other relevant documents can be found on our Substack.
^t.co/cXf4aYdwsq^

Tempest (the claimant or C) is claiming discrimination, harassment and/or victimisation on grounds of gender reassignment. Central to the claim is the Sex Equality and Equity Network in the Civil Service (SEEN or IP). SEEN has been granted right to intervene.

We are a small group of volunteer citizen journalists. We receive no payment for our work. We accept paid subscriptions to our Substack to fund necessary expenses including travel, legal fees and digital costs. Please consider subscribing to our Substack, link in bio.

A reminder that our work is not a verbatim account or transcript of proceedings. We make our best efforts to report what is said and do so in good faith.

We expect that the cross examination of Nicola Bettesworth, DEFRA Chief People Officer by Naomi Cunningham, barrister for SEEN, to conclude this morning. Carolyn Airs, is expected to be the next witness.
Abbreviations that may be used are below

J - Employment Judge S.D. Robertson
P - one or other of the two lay panel members
ST/C - Samantha Tempest, claimant
HH - Helen Hogben, barrister for claimant
DEFRA/R1 - Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, first respondent

RPA/R2 - Rural Payments Agency, second respondent
Rs - First and second respondents
AL - Alexander Line, Respondents' Barrister
SEEN - Sex Equality and Equity Network - Civil Service SEEN-DEFRA - the DEFRA branch of SEEN

NC - Naomi Cunningham, barrister for SEEN as intervenor
CS: Civil Service
IX: Investigation
Grv: Grievance
WS: Witness Statement

CA - Carolyn Airs, at the relevant time was Inclusive Practice and Senior Policy Advisor at DEFRA, in EDI team. Has since retired.
We will return when the hearing begins.

Possibly of interest to our followers; @SexMattersOrg is taking the CPS to court over its guidance on deception and consent. @nickwallis may be reporting.

I can do from 12 noon for the rest of the afternoon, let me know @Jimmyneutronsforehead nearer the time what you feel able to do.

It sounded to me as though those people were, at least in some cases, being contacted (ST talked about people getting emails from their line managers) - that's part of what he objects to!

I think the missing factor there is how reasonable it is/was to feel harassed simply by SEEN existing and being able to say “I view sex as binary and immutable”. The respondents should be able to demonstrate that they supported ST to be more resilient (not sure they have on that point) and took reasonable steps to limit ST’s ‘exposure’ to people with different, legally held and expressed, opinions (they’ve ticked this box).

Any action by the employer also needs to be proportionate and reasonable and they seem to have realised that suppressing the legal discussion of several hundred (?) employees in SEEN v a handful of other sensitive employees would not be either proportionate or reasonable. Whether the panel agree or not is to be seen. (Pun unintended)

But wouldn't DEFRA then need to take that into account going forward, either by not permitting any networks at all, or by heavily controlling only some...which would surely not be reasonable or even within their own rules or codes of conduct?

I wonder if when they start late they are doing important legal stuff, or just being inefficient? Every four days they start 15 minutes late loses them an hour, on the face of it...

Please let today be less mind numbingly boring than yesterday. I cannot go through another day of 200 ways to ask exactly the same question.

From TT:

We are WFTCHTJ

It is 10:10, we have not been admitted to the video conference. Experience to date is that clerks have started video conference promptly; likely that the start time is delayed, we have no information on why.

I guess they are deciding how the remaining 3 days will be used, and considering how much extra time will be needed, when it can be scheduled. With tetchiness all round.