Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre has been ordered to pay nearly £70,000 towards a former worker who was constructively dismissed over her gender critical beliefs.
The charity, which supports victims of sexual violence and abuse, was ordered by an employment tribunal hearing held on 14 October to pay a sum of £68,990 to Roz Adams, a former counselling and support worker at the centre.
The tribunal also ordered the charity to issue an apology to Adams for alleging that she was transphobic and to issue a statement saying that Beira’s Place, a women-only rape crisis centre in Edinburgh where Adams currently works, provides an alternative source of the support for female victims of sexual violence.
Although the remedy documents show that Adams had received an apology after the tribunal’s initial judgement, Adams felt that it “did not clear her name” since it was not a public apology.
The charity has since issued a public apology from its board, saying: “We want to publicly apologise, and we understand that Roz’s actions were not motivated by transphobia, but by a genuine wish to act in the best interests of service users.
“We should have listened more to Roz’s concerns and never pursued disciplinary action and for that we are sorry.”
The tribunal’s remedies and the charity’s subsequent apology were issued after a tribunal ruled earlier this year that Adams was unfairly constructively dismissed and discriminated against on the grounds of her gender critical beliefs.
The tribunal, which held hearings on various dates in January and April this year, found that the charity’s decision to launch a disciplinary process against Adams was because the centre’s management wanted to make an example of her gender critical beliefs.
The tribunal stated that when Adams joined ERCC in February 2021, she was supportive of transgender people and “excited” by the centre’s trans inclusion policy.
But in the following months she began to feel there were issues around the way that gender issues were dealt with by the organisation, telling the tribunal that the atmosphere was “eggshelly”.
The tribunal said it was Adams’ belief that in most circumstances the distinction between biological sex and gender identity did not matter, but in a service dealing with sexual violence the centre “should be honest and clear when asked to give a clear and unambiguous answer in order to provide that service users give informed consent”.
According to the tribunal, Adams herself does not believe that everyone has a gender identity and she “believes that a trauma-informed approach to supporting survivors of sexual violence entails respecting both their understanding of others as male or female and their choice about whether they wish to engage with male or female support workers”.
The charity’s management opened a disciplinary process against Adams after she sought clarity on how to respond to an abuse survivor who wanted to know if a support worker who identified as non-binary was a man or a woman, the tribunal judgement showed.
Management drafted a response which said that the centre does not have any men in its staff or volunteer team and advised against divulging any further details about the staff member’s gender identity to avoid breaching the Equality Act.
Adams responded saying that the situation seemed like a “minefield” and requested more information about the legal framework involved.
The conversations escalated and the following month Adams was invited to an investigation meeting regarding “potentially transphobic” views, with a disciplinary process launched shortly after.
The allegations of misconduct were upheld but no action was taken, with Adams eventually choosing to resign.
The tribunal found the investigation should not have been launched and “was clearly motivated by a strong belief amongst the senior management and some of the claimant’s colleagues that the claimant’s views were inherently hateful”.
It also said that the charity’s then-chief executive, Mridul Wadhwa, a trans woman who resigned in September this year, appeared to believe that Adams was transphobic, leading to a “completely spurious and mishandled disciplinary process”.
The statement from ERCC’s board said that the charity had “learnt a lot” from what was a “challenging and complex case”, saying: “We recognise that during the employment tribunal with Roz Adams we did not act in the right way.
“Steps have already been taken to address the outcomes of both the tribunal and recommendations provided by Rape Crisis Scotland.
“Our focus for the future is ensuring we can provide survivors with the best possible service and support they need to aid their recovery. We are committed to ensuring that ERCC is a safe, accessible and inclusive service for all.”