‘Gender critical’ barrister claims she lost work for opposing Stonewall scheme

A barrister who is suing an LGBTQ charity and her chambers over claims that her gender views were discriminated against said she was deprived of work for opposing an employer diversity scheme, according to legal documents.

Allison Bailey claims she saw the amount of work she was asked to undertake drop off after voicing concerns, according to the opening skeleton argument presented to a tribunal.

The document outlined how Ms Bailey, who founded gender-critical campaign group LGB Alliance, opposed the adoption of the Stonewall Diversity Champions scheme by her employer, Garden Court Chambers, in December 2018.

According to the argument, she suggested the charity was complicit in a “campaign of harassment” against people who question “trans self-ID ideology”, a viewpoint which lawyers said caused a “strong negative reaction at the most senior level” within the chambers.

Her legal team added how, over the following year, she saw “a substantial reduction in the quality and quantity of work for which she was clerked, which cannot be adequately explained by other factors”.

According to the document, the chambers later launched an investigation into a number of complaints made following a tweet on October 22 2019, in which Ms Bailey announced the launch of the LGB Alliance and said “gender extremism is about to meet its match”.

The chambers also replied to a number of tweets from other users, saying that “her views are expressed in a personal capacity and do not represent a position adopted by Garden Court”, the document revealed.

Ms Bailey is also said to claim Stonewall tried to persuade Garden Court to cut its associations with her over her support of gender-critical beliefs after two tweets in September and October 2019, which criticised the charity.

In the first, she said Stonewall had hired Morgan Page, an activist and writer who she described as “a male-bodied person who ran workshops with the sole aim of coaching heterosexual men who identify as lesbians on how they can coerce young lesbians into having sex with them”.

In the second, she thanked a Sunday Times journalist for “reporting on the appalling levels of intimidation, fear and coercion that are driving the @stonewalluk trans self-ID agenda”.

According to her legal team’s opening argument, Stonewall subsequently submitted a complaint which said “for Garden Court Chambers to continue associating” with Ms Bailey, puts the organisation “in a difficult position”, before stating “I trust that you will do what is right and stand in solidarity with trans people.”

Her lawyers said: “The only possible interpretation of the statement… is that the outcome sought was for Garden Court to cease ‘associating’ with the claimant.”

Another opening statement supplied to the tribunal by Garden Court’s legal team stated Ms Bailey was asked to remove the tweets as a result of the investigation but refused, after which no further action was taken against her.

It added there was “not one shred of evidence” to suggest she was deprived of work.

The LGB Alliance has previously said there is a conflict between the rights of lesbian, gay and bisexual people, and transgender people.

Gender-critical beliefs include that sex is biological and immutable, and that the word “woman” is defined as “adult human female”.

Ms Bailey is suing both Stonewall and Garden Court for discrimination, and has raised more than £495,000 to fund her legal case.

The tribunal continues.