A nurse who complained about sharing a women's locker room with a transgender doctor has won part of her employment dispute. National Health Service Fife, but her claim against the doctor in question was dismissed.
Sandy Peggy, a nurse for over 30 years, claimed to have been unlawfully harassed under the Equality Act when she had to share a dressing room with Dr. Beth Upton.
In a written decision handed down on Monday, the tribunal upheld Peggy's harassment claim against the health board but rejected other claims. He also dismissed the nurse's claim against Upton, whose testimony was found to be “more reliable and materially more coherent in nature.”
The decision was immediately criticized by gender activists as “disappointing” due to its failure to provide employers with clarity on the practical application of the April decision. Supreme Court decision on biological sex.
The case revolved around a controversial incident that took place in a changing room at the Victoria Hospital in Kirkcaldy on Christmas Eve 2023, following which Upton made allegations of bullying and harassment and raised concerns about patient care, resulting in Peggy being placed on special leave.
Peggy brought a claim against both Upton and NHS Fife, citing the Equality Act 2010, including sexual harassment, harassment based on protected beliefs, indirect discrimination and victimization.
The Dundee Employment Tribunal heard two pieces of evidence in February and July before Judge Sandy Kemp.
In an interim statement, Peggy said she was “immensely relieved and relieved” that the prosecution had occurred, adding that “the last two years have been excruciating for me and my family.” She is expected to give a more detailed response later this week.
The 312-page ruling found that NHS Fife harassed Peggy by failing to revoke Upton's permission to temporarily use the women's changing room after her initial complaint until other working arrangements for the couple came into force.
He also found the panel took an “unreasonable” amount of time to investigate allegations of grooming that she left a patient to avoid seeing Dr Upton. Although they appeared in January 2024, it was not until July 2025 that NHS Fife confirmed that Peggy was Individual gross misdemeanor charges dropped after an 18-month internal process.
The ruling questioned the credibility of some of Peggy's testimony, such as her attempt to distance herself from offensive remarks about flood victims in Pakistan, but also rejected other attacks on her professional performance, describing her “unblemished 30-year career until the Christmas Eve incident.”
Addressing comments Peggy made to Upton during the Christmas Eve incident, using language she “knew or reasonably should have known would be offensive”, the decision concluded that “transphobia” is not a legal term and accepted as the nurse's “entirely genuine” concern “that a person she believed to be male was entering a space she considered private to those who were biologically female.”
A hearing to determine what relief Peggy is entitled to will be scheduled at a later date.
The case was closely followed throughout the UK to see how April decision of the Supreme Court that the terms “woman” and “sex” in the Equality Act refer only to biological woman and biological sex.
In his decision, Kemp argued that the Supreme Court's decision was “not determinative” of the use of the locker room. “It may be legal to grant a transgender person permission to use the locker room that corresponds to the sex and gender they identify with, depending on the circumstances.”
It concluded that the decision did not result in allowing the use of a women's changing room at work to be inherently unlawful for a transwoman who is a biological male under the Equality Act. Conversely, having a protected characteristic of gender reassignment did not mean that permission to use the locker room was necessarily legal.
Peggy's lawyer, Margaret Gribbon, described the tribunal's finding as “a huge victory for the resilient and courageous woman standing up for her gender rights.”
But Maya Forstater, chief executive of gender rights charity Sex Matters, said that “overall we are disappointed by the tribunal's approach, which sought to strike a false 'balance' between a woman's right to undress in a manner respectful of privacy and dignity and the right of a worker with the protected characteristic of gender reassignment not to be discriminated against in employment.
“This case shows that employers with ambiguous policies are putting themselves in legal jeopardy. But the tribunal has failed to provide them with the clarity they need to be confident they can say 'no' to men who want to use women's facilities in a simple and clear manner.”
Susan Smith, co-director of the For Women Campaign Scotlandwho brought the case against the Scottish Government that resulted in the Supreme Court decision, said: “Tribunal courts should not attempt to overturn the decision of the UK's highest court.
NHS Fife, which has been criticized for spending at least £220,500 defending the case, said it would take time to work out the details of the decision.
“We want to acknowledge how difficult this tribunal has been for everyone directly and indirectly involved. Our focus now is to ensure that NHS Fife remains a welcoming and inclusive environment for all staff and our patients, and to ensure the health and care of the people of Fife,” it said.
The decision comes a week after an employee who objected to trans women using women's toilets at Leonardo UK's Edinburgh office lost her discrimination claim against the firm. An employment tribunal has ruled that the toilet policy is a “proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim” of creating an inclusive work environment for transgender people.
Jess O'Thomson, director of the transgender rights nonprofit Good Law Project, said both decisions contradict the argument that the Supreme Court's decision automatically bans transgender people from using restrooms. “The Tribunal was clear that the law does not now require transgender people to be banned from single-sex spaces.”
