Jolyon Maugham KC
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Jolyon Maugham KC
@goodlawproject.org
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Founder and Director, Good Law Project. King's Counsel. Hon Prof at Durham University.

Live your values. Fight the power. Keep the receipts.

He/him.

https://goodlaw.social/nm7n
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An important point to come out of the Sandie Peggie case is that 'gender critical' employees can't take matters into their own hands and confront trans employees. If they do that it is likely to be harassment/ bullying/ a hate incident.
So far as her other comments are concerned, they were impermissible manifestations of her belief and were in our view what amounted to an incident of harassment by the claimant of the second respondent related to the protected characteristic of gender reassignment, reasonably perceived by the second respondent to be so, and were a breach by the claimant of section 26 of the Act and of the Bullying and Harassment Policy. The second respondent was entitled to view the actions of the claimant in those particular regards as being such harassment, or as a “hate incident” within the policy, and the first respondent was entitled in principle to act on the complaint made, but the detail of how it did so depends on all the circumstances as more fully addressed below. The second respondent was also entitled to regard the claimant’s actions as a breach of the second respondent’s Article 8 rights, so far as the claimant’s expression of her beliefs was impermissible. 1034. We also considered that the claimant had acted deliberately to be able to challenge the second respondent whilst they were alone. What she did was to wait until other members of staff had left the changing room, and for the second respondent to leave the cubicle, before raising her own beliefs directly with the second respondent in the manner we have set out. 1035. Whilst the claimant had not been informed as promptly and in the detail we considered appropriate, and the first respondent did not consider whether to revoke permission at all, the claimant did not herself raise any formal grievance under the policy. She is an experienced member of staff who had access to union advice. She knew, or ought reasonably to have known, that the first respondent having granted permission to the second respondent she required to have raised her concerns with the first respondent as the decision-maker rather than with the colleague to whom it had been granted, and in any event ought not to have done so in the manner that she did.
December 9, 2025 at 9:20 AM
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She won her case like you won the general election.
December 8, 2025 at 5:36 PM
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Also worth noting, the Tribunal found that Sandie Peggie had harassed Dr Beth Upton in a "hate incident".
December 8, 2025 at 5:08 PM
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Well, the Tribunal does float that possibility.
December 8, 2025 at 2:49 PM
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I can't help but remember that "it" is also the word used by the man who murdered poor Brianna Ghey in a transphobic attack.

These people don't have "reasonable concerns" - they are revolting bigots.
632. A wider aspect of evidence we considered concerned an attack on her position in cross examination to the effect that she was generally transphobic, which she denied both when giving evidence initially and on recall (which is addressed further below). Some of the messages she sent are indicative of views which could be described as trans-phobic. In one dated 10 January 2024 the claimant described the second respondent as “it”. In an earlier part of the same message there is reference to the second respondent having a shadow (being in our view a reference to the appearance of stubble on the face) and a “pathetic voice”. These are disparaging remarks in relation to the second respondent in our view, because of the second respondent being a trans woman. 633. In another the second respondent is described as a “weirdo”, which the claimant sought to explain as someone acting weirdly, but which we did not accept as being what she had intended by use of that word. These remarks we consider to be consistent with other evidence of her making comments the second respondent was liable to find offensive that went beyond the simple expression of a gender critical belief, but amounted to personal attacks on the second respondent.
December 8, 2025 at 2:46 PM
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Oooft. Sandie Peggie shared highly offensive messages and was then "untruthful" in giving evidence to the Tribunal.

This is the 'hero' Gender Critical campaigners have chosen.
631. The third aspect was her evidence given when recalled in relation to a message she had passed on to her group of friends which related to floods in Pakistan in the most highly offensive terms. She initially described the messages as “dark humour”. Her evidence later was that the message had been sent to provoke a reaction, in broad summary. We did not consider that latter evidence to be credible given the content of the message sent and her initial evidence about it. In our view it was an untruthful attempt to downplay what she had done, which she recognised as having included very offensive material. We consider that it was clear beyond serious argument that the author or authors of the original message considered the remarks humorous, and that the claimant had also considered them humorous which was why she had passed them on. That was supported in our view by her reference to dark humour
December 8, 2025 at 2:34 PM
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This is a real disaster for those - pretty much the entirety of the British media - advancing a maximalist reading of the For (Some) Women Scotland decision.
796. Thirdly, the claimant’s contention was in our view not consistent with the court’s comment that “we have concluded that a biological sex interpretation would not have the effect of disadvantaging or removing important protection under the EA 2010 from trans people (whether with or without a GRC).” 797. After that comment the court explained that a person with gender reassignment as a protected characteristic could pursue a claim of direct or indirect discrimination, or of harassment, if the circumstances so warranted. There was no qualification to it to the effect that that was not applicable in, for example, the context of a single sex space under Part 5 of the Act. If their decision had been that all trans persons must be excluded from the changing rooms or toilets for the sex they identify with because it was not the sex assigned at birth, and may also be excluded from the changing rooms or toilets of their biological sex, that in our view certainly does impact on their rights under section 7. 798. Were the claimant’s contention to be correct that would have the effect of materially reducing the extent to which that protected characteristic could be relied on by trans persons, to their disadvantage. What was desired by the trans person when living their life may not be permitted in a large number of practical instances, and would not have been consistent with the view expressed by Lady Hale in Work and Pensions, and the line of authority in relation to human rights. Such a construction in our view would also not be consistent with the interpretation of the Equal Treatment Directive from the CJEU and its predecessor as referred to above, which remains as assimilated law, and would not be consistent with a purposive interpretation still required. The development of the law in relation to what is now the protected characteristic of gender reassignment is set out above. At the very least we would have expected these considerations to have been addressed speci…
December 8, 2025 at 2:24 PM
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This is the key paragraph in the Sandie Peggie decision.
(i) The Supreme Court decision 789. The question that arises from that conclusion is whether the application of the Supreme Court decision must mean that, under the provisions over which this Tribunal has jurisdiction under the 2010 Act as to work, the second respondent as a biological male required to be excluded from the female changing room, such that the permission given by the first respondent to do so was necessarily unlawful under those provisions. We have concluded that the answer is in the negative.
December 8, 2025 at 2:07 PM
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Some robust criticism is made of the way in which Naomi Cunningham conducted herself. Query whether this is going to come before her professional regulator.
There were some rather unusual questions asked in cross examination, for example Ms Cunningham asked a question seeking to compare the second respondent to the torturer in the novel 1984, to which objection was taken and after the lunch adjournment but before a decision on that was made it was withdrawn. It ought not to have been asked, but does indicate the extent to which the second respondent’s position was challenged in cross examination.
December 8, 2025 at 1:41 PM
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The Times yesterday, on how trans kids, denied the healthcare they need, are buying black market hormones.

Of course, this is *exactly* what everyone said would happen. And its risks are dramatically amplified by Streeting telling GPs they must stop offering blood tests.
“He didn’t have the money, so they paid for him to get some black market oestrogen,” Fiona said. “He got it sent to a friend who passed it on at school. And he managed to get shots and syringes from an STD clinic.” Experts are increasingly concerned that an illicit trade in black market cross-sex hormones is thriving as the NHS clamps down on prescriptions of the drugs for fear of long-term side effects.
December 8, 2025 at 11:00 AM
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This is NOT FUNNY AT ALL (giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...).
A Reform UK councillor’s business has been handed a £40,000 fine after the company was found to have hired someone without the legal right to work in the UK.
December 8, 2025 at 6:06 AM
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You don't need an investigative journalist to know who is funding work of the Free Speech Union: its a foreign Far Right billionaire called Elon Musk.
December 6, 2025 at 7:00 PM
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December 5, 2025 at 5:27 PM
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won't you celebrate with me.
December 3, 2025 at 10:15 AM
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Here is Maya Forstater of the Sex Matters charity with Richard Dunstan only weeks ago. And Sex Matters describing him as its "good friend".
December 1, 2025 at 1:09 PM
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I thought I could not be shocked by what prominent transphobes feel able to say about me. Turns out I was wrong.

Here is Richard Dunstan, a prominent commentator closely associated with the Sex Matters charity, speculating that I enjoyed being sexually assaulted as a child.
December 1, 2025 at 1:08 PM
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You're not cross enough! First and second headlines from The Times.

(Telling how consistently male gaze is the 'feminism' of The Times.)
December 1, 2025 at 11:41 AM
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Professor Deborah Prentice, Vice Chancellor at Cambridge University, is getting some grief for this headline which suggests she is cosying up to Reform. But what she has *actually* said is entirely right and sensible.

My question is, why is The Times seeking to undermine Cambridge University?
November 30, 2025 at 5:00 PM
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When Hundred Reasons, my brother in law's band, headlined the Royal Albert Hall only weeks after the disgraceful For Some Women Scotland decision Larry Hibbitt wore a t-shirt with a trans flag. It meant so much to me.

Hate will never win.❤️
November 30, 2025 at 12:45 PM
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Super excited about this Good Law Project and Not a Phase gig at Wembley. www.theguardian.com/music/2025/n...
November 29, 2025 at 7:14 AM
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You could substitute so many Labour initiatives for "Motability cuts" and this headline would still make sense. What a tragedy this Government is.
November 29, 2025 at 6:33 AM
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Gosh, Laura Bates' 'The New Age of Sexism' is extraordinary.

This is a book every policy maker, certainly every male policy maker, needs to read.
November 28, 2025 at 12:03 PM
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"Coronation": the latest thinking on how to overcome the fact the Labour membership would never choose Wesley.
November 26, 2025 at 6:53 AM
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Even Hilary Cass - who disgracefully called parents terrified that their trans kids would take their own lives if they were denied healthcare "shroud wavers" - didn't go so far as to call for a ban on puberty blockers.

Nothing Wes Streeting says turns out to be true.
Wes Streeting tweet: "Dr Cass recommended a ban on prescribing them and a clinical trial to build that evidence. Kings College London has now launched that trial."
November 24, 2025 at 7:24 AM
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"gender ideology is anti-gravity nonsense that only the desperate, the deluded and the double-dealing grifters still believe": just in case you were still wondering quite how consumed with hatred are Hadley Freeman and The Sunday Times.
November 23, 2025 at 8:10 AM