Tempest v Rural Payments Agency Tribunal Thread 8

[myladydisdainisyetliving]

Previous thread: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5551959-tempest-v-rural-payments-agency-tribunal-thread-7

TT substack: https://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 imagine because you weren’t personally promoting it. The prohibition is nothing to do with GC issues, it’s because they were abused to manipulate people for money in the past.

I'm sure you are correct. There is half a raised eyebrow that a TRA campaign can be posted here but not a GC one.

So if links to crowd funders are forbidden and that one was approved, then I really don't understand the logic of it. 🤔
I assumed it depended on how likely it was to get noticed, depending on the method of posting.
Eta just saw @Ereshkigalangcleg 's post which probably explains the logic part of it.

Head of DEFRA appointed as new CQC chief exec

https://www.thecarehomeenvironment.com/story/52057/former-food-standards-chief-hired-to-lead-the-cqc-amid-ongoing-shake-up

cqc is completely captured so let's see what she does, if anything, about that

We should arrange a posse to give CA a birthday cake once she's finished giving evidence on the first day of the December session!

Better make it a small cake then. As mentioned upthread she placed restrictions on SEEN. She followed the law eventually but she wasnt unbiased. The garden still needs more plants folks, chair of SEEN sued for saying only women menstruate finds it.

I think that, as for many of us, it took CA a while to realise the profound and toxic selfishness with which ST and his ilk view and interact with the world. I suspect she went into this assuming both sides would act like rational adults.

She was great in cross examination but she wasn’t like that when the issues were live in 2022/23. As anyolddinosaur points out, it took her quite a while to follow the actual law.

Don't forget that she is now retired & free to speak her mind.

True. But she absolutely wasn’t on the side of the law when SEEN first launched. She did learn, though, probably helped along by the behaviour of the TRA side as evidenced in this tribunal, plus having the actual law constantly pointed out to her. Eyes have been opened in all sorts of ways by this tribunal.

SO WHO FUNDS TINKERBELL'S CASE?

Today I stumbled upon this video, in which the lovely RMW (ex-barrister in this case) and the equally lovely Rachel Saunders (middle-aged philosopher bloke who plays on a women's hockey team in his free time) are having a lovely chat about how to overturn the FWS SCJ via lawfare.

And according to RWM, it is really important to find the right test case, and that is one who has access to legal aid, so that the whole business has to get funded by the taxpayer (because apparently only those stupid wimmin do crowdfunders to ask for money from people who want to support their case, the right side of history takes it from the taxpayers, including those whose rights they are trying to take away).

So is it possible that Tinks qualified for legal aid because of being unable to work for 6+ months, despite being on full pay for most of the time? (RMW did not mention him, but apparently plans something with those TIMs who have to go to men's prison now).

Does anybody know exactly how this works?

(I think that part was at about 15 min)

m.youtube.com/watch?v=1kdov-0KFW4

Also in this lovely video (at about 5 min):

Overthrowing FWS by putting babies to trans moobs!

Yes seriously. Apparently the EHRC wrote a guidance that says that the PC of maternity extends to women who breastfeed children they haven't given birth to.
And since TIMs also 'breastfeed', they have to get recognised as women, otherwise the category of woman is incoherent and unworkable. Or something.

So it's not just a fetish, it is trying to create a case for TWAW in law! 🤮🤬

Is it just a coincidence that Tinks was hanging around in women's breastfeeding support groups? Is that just his personal voyeurism, or are other things at play here?

And does anyone know more about this maternity guidance, which is apparently different from the definition in the EA and that RMW thinks he can use? Could that even work?!

And all of that just in the first 20 min of that video - I haven't got the stomach to watch/listen to the rest right now...

I do not think you can get full legal aid for an employment tribunal, only for advice not representation at the proceedings.

And it is means tested. So tinker bell would probably not qualify for any funding.

I think it's more likely that there's a JKR for the other side. Just one who's a little more shy about expressing support.

I saw that the other day, got bored after a couple of minutes. The funniest bit is that the subtitles mishear and say that RMW is a hardworking barista 🤣 🤣

The transcript refers at one point to For Women Scotland as "poor women's Scotland" & at another to "four women Scotland".😀

That's quite nice, actually, given that they were originally four women Scotland. At one stage they thought it was only the four of them who thought like this about the Scottish Goverment's legislation.

I posted on one of the Amnesty threads that, if not for ST's brief boring on, this case would have wrapped up and the panel beginning their deliberations just in time for the anti-rights report release. As all the SEEN networks were listed as anti-rights on the report i wondered if this was done deliberately to influence the findings before dismissing the idea as a bit conspiracy theory-esque.

However, I've still been thinking and I've decided it doesn't matter if it was part of some plan or not. The report, even inadvertently, could have had the effect of influencing the panel. The ET is, in part, about the existence of SEEN and here's a renown Human Rights organisation unequivocally denouncing them. IANAL i don't know if AI have broken any law if they have, even accidentally, attempted to interfer in the Tribunal. I'm minded to think they probably haven't. It would be difficult to publish anything if you were meant to avoid any possible overlap with ongoing cases. It's just this is a hell of an overlap and it makes the taste left by the report even nastier.

I find it hard to believe that ST has legal aid. He’s returned to work as an HEO (I believe) and starting salary is about £32k.

Also legal aid would have oushed for a settlement, amd as someone else said above, not available for a tribunal.

I keep coming back to Tink’s numerous statements about visibility of SEEN and how it was a sign of people not having his best interests at heart….why the fuck should anyone have his best interests at heart especially when those interests are opposed to others on the same workplace. GI really attracts the most selfish people. If ‘best interests’ comes from the PSED then perhaps it does need to be scrapped.

He certainly didn’t have anyone in SEEN’s best interests at heart, nor any female colleague/employee. Sauce for the goose etc.

Someone may have already posted this. NC explained her bundle management process on a legal podcast about 18 months ago. It’s safe to say she’s very organised and knows her way around a spreadsheet. 👍

It’s exciting to have finally caught up early enough to post before a thread is full. 🙂

I have a question for the Hive Mind though. Why is this case not attracting press interest? Would appreciate thoughts on this.

At the heart of the case, big picture, the evidence is about two different camps having beef on the company intranet and one person taking a complaint right up to tribunal. Being rude and picking fights on the internet is normalised. Many people would be meh shrug whatevs.

The hearing has actually shown up
the asymmetric nature of the beef. IMO Elspeth’s evidence about the scale of the TRA bullying coupled with ED’s proud admission of doxxing SEEN members and ST’s total inflexibility to allow any freedom of expression by GC colleagues will make it newsworthy. At this partially heard juncture we don’t have the full picture. This case may end up being a useful counterbalance and illustrative of the risks in the conversion bill debate.

This is me on an optimistic day. 🙂

I'm a bit surprised it has not been picked up yet by the right wing press, I expect it will be later. Sometimes the press like to keep these stories to use when they think it will most embarrass the government.

Interesting thought, yes... I think someone suggested way up-thread(s) that Amnesty were a possibility for who was funding Tinks, and others said that wasn't the kind of thing they do. It might still not be coincidence though - maybe a rich individual or organisation closely associated with Amnesty is funding him? Pure speculation of course and I don't even speculatively have a name to attach to the rich individual or organisation.

Edit: if I were EDW or AM, I might do a subject access request to Amnesty and see what they had on me.