Why flags and rainbows in the workplace mean big trouble for the NHS
A doctor told to remove a small Palestinian flag from her plant pot claims the practice manager who issued the order was wearing a rainbow lanyard at the time
It’s going to be a bumper autumn for NHS lawyers in Scotland. The employment tribunal panel in the Sandie Peggie case is due to begin deliberations soon. Their task, to decide if the Fife nurse was subject to unlawful harassment when she was expected to share a changing room with a transgender doctor.
As if that case wasn’t controversial enough, lawyers for the NHS are also embroiled in another hot topic. Coming up next is an employment tribunal where a trainee GP is suing the Scottish health service for discrimination and censorship because she was ordered to stop displaying Palestinian flags at work.
Dr Tamara Ali wore a Palestinian pin badge and displayed a small flag in the same colours in a plant pot in her consulting room. Following an anonymous complaint from a patient, she was ordered to remove them by a practice manager.
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Ukrainian flags allowed
Now Dr Ali is taking legal action against the GP practice and the NHS, claiming the case involves the suppression of her rights to freedom of expression and harassment due to her race, religion and beliefs.
The case centres on the question of consistency. Dr Ali claims the practice manager who ordered her to remove the flags was wearing a rainbow lanyard in support of LGBTQ+ rights. NHS workers have also been allowed to wear and display Ukrainian flags.
“If you’re going to allow public expressions of support for one protected characteristic, then why not others?” says her solicitor Zillur Rahman. “It seems as if, currently, the practice was changing the rules depending on the issue, which is not the way that the law works.”
With flags, badges and lanyards, the reality is that one person’s freedom of expression can just as easily be another person’s intimidation or harassment.
That’s why NHS rules state doctors should not express political or moral beliefs in a way that “could reasonably cause patients distress”. Until recently that meant keeping your opinions and beliefs to yourself.
Hired to work, not promote beliefs
What changed was an acceptance and encouragement by some in positions of power that certain causes deserve to be platformed and promoted. And that is the argument NHS lawyers will face in this case. Who is choosing which causes are allowed and on what basis?
Moving forward there’s an obvious way to solve this issue and that is to go back to basics. You may passionately believe in a cause or you may support something because it is the flavour of the moment but neither really matters. What matters is that when it comes to the workplace the clue is in the name.
Employees are hired to work, not to spread, support or promote ideas or beliefs. Before and after work they can campaign, cajole, encourage and do whatever they feel is necessary because that is on their time as individuals. In work, it is different.
The mistake has been to allow and even encourage some symbols in the workplace in the belief that they are progressive while trying to draw a line to stop others that are seen as problematic.
Regardless of the outcome of this case, employers must decide, is work a place where personal beliefs are left at home or where they are showcased and platformed? It may have all started with a lanyard but much more is at stake.
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