A Scottish nurse who complained about having to get changed in front of a transgender woman has beaten an attempt by the NHS to hold her tribunal in secret.
An employment judge emphatically rejected NHS Fife’s application to impose reporting restrictions and anonymity orders on a case brought by Sandie Peggie, who is claiming she faced harassment and discrimination.
The health board accused Ms Peggie of bullying and suspended her after she complained about the presence of a trans woman doctor while she was changing in female facilities at the Victoria Hospital in Kirkcaldy.
In a rare move, NHS Fife and the doctor formally requested that next month’s hearing of the case should take place behind closed doors and that the identity of both the medic and the hospital remain undisclosed. 9
But as a result of the judge’s decision, it can now be revealed that the doctor in is Beth Upton, who “considers herself a woman and uses she/her pronouns”.
According to Dr Upton, the fact that she was trans was not known to all staff at the hospital. She also voiced fears of “anti-trans violence” if, as would be normal, her name was reported.
However, following a case management hearing, Judge Antoine Tinnion rejected the health board and Dr Upton’s arguments, ruling that there was “wholly legitimate public interest in this case, with the BBC, other media and other campaigning groups wishing to attend the final hearing and be permitted to report it”.
The judge also dismissed the claims of possible violence as “theoretical, not real”.
Ms Peggie, who has worked in the NHS for more than 30 years, said she was “very pleased” that the tribunal would proceed in public. “Going to employment tribunal is very stressful for all concerned,” she said, “but everyone has the right to a fair and public hearing. Changing rooms are a place where we expect privacy. Courtrooms are not.
“My case is about whether the hospital and Dr Upton subjected me to sexual harassment and discrimination by forcing me and other female colleagues to share a changing room with a man identifying as a woman.”
Like many NHS bodies, Fife allows staff to use facilities in line with their self-declared gender identity, rather than biological sex.
The case centres around three incidents in 2023 during which Ms Peggie said she encountered Dr Upton in female changing rooms, once while the nurse was in only a bra and trousers. On the third occasion Dr Upton started to undress and the pair “exchanged words”.
While what was said is disputed, Ms Peggie claims that Dr Upton refused to leave the changing room and later lodged an unfounded bullying complaint against her. She also claims she faced harassment from her employer by being subjected to the changing room incidents as well as the subsequent disciplinary action when she was placed on special leave and then suspended for several months before being forced to change her shift patterns.
She remains employed by NHS Fife and is now back at work.
Ms Peggie says that when she first met Dr Upton in August 2023 she “believed she was speaking to a man” and that patients at the hospital also thought the A&E medic “looks like a man”. She continues to believe that Dr Upton “notwithstanding her self-identified gender status, is male and a man”.
Trina Budge, a director of For Women Scotland, one of the parties who formally opposed the NHS application, said: “We’re glad the tribunal upheld the vital principles of open justice and ruled this case will not be heard behind closed doors.
“This case is of great interest to women, particularly to those many NHS employees who will be facing similar breaches to their privacy in changing rooms up and down the country.”
Dr Sandesh Gulhane MSP, the health spokesman for the Scottish Conservatives, questioned why scarce NHS resources were being spent on an attempt to “cover up” the case rather than addressing “dangerously high” waiting times.
A ten day hearing is due to start on 3rd February.
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