A transgender doctor has been accused at an employment tribunal of “role playing” as a woman by using a female changing room. Dr Beth Upton and NHS Fife health board have been taken to the tribunal by Sandie Peggie, who has worked as a nurse at the Victoria Hospital in Kirkcaldy for 30 years and was suspended following an incident in the women’s changing rooms at the hospital on Christmas Eve 2023. Peggie lodged a complaint of sexual harassment or harassment related to a protected belief under Section 26 of the Equality Act 2010 regarding three incidents that occurred when she shared a changing room with Upton. Her complaint was made after she was suspended in January last year over an allegation of bullying and harassment lodged by Upton. Naomi Cunningham, representing Peggie at the tribunal in Dundee, accused Upton during Tuesday’s hearing of “immersive role play”.
Discussing one incident, Cunningham said: “What Sandie Peggie has done by withdrawing from [the] changing room when you were there is opted out of immersive role play. That’s why you [Upton] were angry with her.”
She added: “I want to suggest that the reason it’s not acceptable to you for one colleague to opt out, is the danger that one voice telling the truth will break its spell. It’s like the child in the emperor’s new clothes. That one voice saying you’re a man will break the spell.”