A lesbian social worker has described living though a ‘Kafkaesque nightmare’ after being disciplined for making a ‘transphobic’ comment about a ‘gender-fluid’ dog.
Elizabeth Pitt, 63, faced complaints after voicing ‘gender critical’ views on a Zoom call for the LGBTQIA+ group at her local authority Cambridgeshire County Council.
She later took the council to a tribunal for harassment and has now been awarded over £55,000 and £8,000 in legal costs after a judge said records showed she suffered because of her ‘gender-critical beliefs’.
Speaking to The Telegraph following the payout, Ms Pitt likened the ordeal to ‘a Kafkaesque nightmare’, which forced her to go on sick leave while suffering from anxiety.
She claimed her rights were ‘being impinged’ and that the council was ‘bullying’ her by making her out as an ‘oppressor’ and a ‘transphobe’.
Ms Pitt told The Telegraph: ‘I didn’t want to complain about anything, I just wanted to get on with my job.
‘These people accusing me of transphobia thought they needed sympathy and empathy but in fact it was my rights which were being impinged. This all comes down to basic common sense.
‘I’ve experienced misogyny and homophobia. But I’m inclusive. I can work with anybody and I can get the best out of people.’
The incident took place during a Zoom meeting in January 2023, when one of the attendees said he ‘identified his dachshund dog as gender-fluid’ and put a dress on the dog to ‘prompt debate about gender’.
Ms Pitt responded – alongside a lesbian colleague of hers – by voicing ‘gender critical views’ which others on the call found ‘offensive’, the tribunal hearing heard.
One said she had a ‘really aggressive tone’ and that he found it ‘quite inappropriate’ that Ms Pitt and her colleague had been commenting on ‘transwomen participating in women’s sports and sharing women’s spaces’.
Recalling the incident herself Ms Pitt said: ‘I joined the meeting late, so I wasn’t even in the meeting when the dog in the frock happened, but apparently one of my colleagues said “He’s got a c*** so he’s a male”.
‘I was told what had happened and the tone of the meeting had been set. At one point I asked “Does anyone believe there’s more than two sexes?” and was told “Yes it’s a spectrum”. I said “I don’t believe it”.’
Ms Pitt and her colleague were then reported for their ‘really aggressive tone’ with views that were deemed to be ‘non-inclusive and transphobic’.
One person was said to be left ‘shaking in disbelief’ and another complaining it gave them ‘anxiety dreams’.
Ms Pitt, who qualified as a social worker in 2007, claimed colleagues were ‘terrified’ of her hereafter and began questioning how she could work with trans people.
In April she was sent a written management instruction, in which she was told to act in a way which ‘ensured her personal views and beliefs did not manifest themselves in comments or actions in the workplace that might discriminate against others on grounds of a protected characteristic’.
She was asked not to contact any members of the LGBTQIA+ group or attend their events, and that the order was an informal stage of the council’s disciplinary procedure.
This prompted Ms Pitt to raise a grievance and in response to her outcome, wrote: ‘There is nothing in the grievance outcome that explains why it has been decided that there was an issue with the way my beliefs were expressed, so how has the conclusion on the expression of my beliefs been reached?’
She did not receive an answer to her question.
Ms Pitt argued the council’s reaction to her expression of gender critical beliefs ‘amounted to harassment/direct discrimination’.
The council accepted her gender critical beliefs amounted to a ‘philosophical belief’, but said it was the ‘manner in which’ she and her colleague ‘chose to promote their views’ that had been ‘aggressive and confrontational’ by talking over people.
Ms Pitt said she was ‘totally shocked and incensed’ after being banned from the group and was ‘treated abysmally’.
She said: ‘Being accused of transphobia is like being accused of racism. It was a massive stress. The whole process was ridiculous.
‘They were bullying me. It’s a mind game to turn it around and make me the oppressor and the transphobe. And they couldn’t actually tell me what I’d said or done that was transphobic.’
Ms Pitt claimed she was constantly being ‘watched’ in the months that followed and eventually went on sick leave suffering from anxiety.
Ms Pitt started a crowdfunding campaign to hire a legal team to take her case to court. This ended up raising over £51,000 and even received support from Martina Navratilova and Sharron Davies on Twitter.
Ms Pitt’s crowdfunded legal team wrote to the council’s solicitors in July 2024, informing them they would be applying for costs.
The letter stated documents left ‘no sensible room for doubt’ that Ms Pitt’s views had caused – ‘in whole or part’ – the council’s impugned conduct which amounted to discrimination or harassment ‘because of her gender critical belief’.
It concluded by inviting the council to ‘admit liability for harassment because of [her] protected belief’, and agreeing to ‘a truncated hearing to deal with remedies only’.
The panel heard on the first day of the final hearing in July 2024, the council ‘admitted liability’ for harassment relating to Ms Pitt’s gender critical beliefs, as well as her sexual orientation.
Employment Judge Paul Michell said: ‘We fully accept that on the face of the documents, [the council] had (at least) reasonable prospects of persuading the tribunal that [Ms Pitt] was treated as set out above in substantial part because of the perceived insensitivity of her raising her views in a forthright manner and in that forum; her being seen as being deliberately provocative (perhaps largely by association, because of her colleague’s behaviour).
‘However, we agree with [Ms Pitt’s lawyer] that the contemporaneous documents unambiguously show that at least part of the reason for [Cambridgeshire County Council] impugned conduct was its response to the manifestation of her gender-critical beliefs.’
He, therefore, awarded Ms Pitt £8,000 in legal costs. She was also awarded nearly £30,000 in loss of earnings and £22,000 compensation for injury to feelings which, with interest added, totalled £55,910.
‘I still stand by what I said. I’m same-sex attracted. For a man to say he’s a woman and is attracted to women and is a lesbian is nonsense,’ Ms Pitt said following the hearing.
‘If a man wants to live as a woman then do as you will, but if a man wants to say he’s a lesbian – no, that’s the boundary. Trans people can have their own groups.’
Ms Pitt claims she is ‘inclusive’ but believes the trans movement is ‘just short of a cult’, adding that the idea that someone can be born in the ‘wrong body’ is ‘disturbing’.
She added: ‘I really think a lot of the social work supporting trans children is tantamount to child abuse. I think language is being captured and people daren’t say anything because they can’t afford to lose their jobs.’
A council spokesman said: ‘We strive to create a safe, inclusive and compassionate environment for people to work in and recognise this needs to be balanced with everyone being entitled to express their own views and beliefs.
‘We will reflect carefully on this final outcome, as well as undertaking a review of our policies and procedures accordingly.’