Samantha Tempest, a civil servant who worked for an arm’s length body supporting rural communities within the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra), claims that her employer failed to properly moderate “inappropriate and hostile” posts about transgender people on a cross-governmental communications platform which was used by civil-service staff.
An employment tribunal in Leeds, which began last week, was told that Ms Tempest took umbrage at posts made by “gender-critical” staff members including a woman with an elevated position at the Sex Equality and Equity Network (SEEN).
The SEEN representative body is a cross-governmental staff network representing those with gender-critical views and believe in biological sex as defined by the Equality Act.
Ms Tempest, whose departmental work was based in the region, is claiming discrimination, harassment and/or victimisation on the grounds of her gender.
The complaints relate to posts that were made on the Yammer intranet service between 2021 and 2023.
Specifically, Ms Tempest says the Yammer communications site, on which the posts were made, should not have been made available to staff.
She said by allowing what she claimed were unmoderated posts on the intranet service, the department had “created a hostile atmosphere for trans, non-binary and intersex” people.
She added: “Trans colleagues had realised that Defra was not going to support them in this manner.”
She said some of the “hostile” posts on Yammer “implied that sex is binary and immutable” and trans people were “merely parodying being a woman”.
She said she and other trans colleagues found some of the messages to be “offensive and creating a toxic environment”. “In my opinion, gender-critical belief is all about denying the existence of transgender people,” she added.
In one of her own comments on Yammer, Ms Tempest wrote: “You are either okay including trans folk or you are okay excluding them in the battle of binary.”
Alex Line, barrister for the respondent Defra, put it to Ms Tempest that this could be seen as intransigence on her part rather than espousing the “middle ground”, to which she replied that the gender-critical posts had been sowing “division” within the department.
When Mr Line put it to Ms Tempest that by saying “gender-critical views shouldn’t be expressed”, she too was being “divisive”, the claimant responded: “If they do start espousing those views to me, I don’t see how anything but division could be created. It harms the harmony of the workplace.”
She added: “If you don’t moderate to contain free speech you can potentially post anything.”
The tribunal, which is expected to run until July 10, continues. It is being overseen by employment judge Mr SD Robertson.
