Anas Sarwar blasts Sandie Peggie's racist posts as 'horrific' and 'completely unacceptable'
During the employment tribunal Sandie Peggie was accused of sharing racist jokes and making racial slurs.
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar has hit out at nurse Sandie Peggie, describing racist jokes made in a WhatsApp chat as “horrific” and “completely unacceptable”.
Ms Peggie is suing her employer NHS Fife and trans doctor Beth Upton for discrimination and sexual harassment over the latter’s use of the female changing room at Victoria Hospital in Kirkcaldy.
The legal action comes after Ms Peggie was suspended for bullying and harassment following an incident between the pair in the emergency department changing room on Christmas Eve in 2023.
Over the past couple of weeks, witnesses have been questioned by an ongoing employment tribunal, including a number of allegations that Ms Peggie had made racist remarks about the Pakistani floods and about a mosque being built in Kirkcaldy.
Mr Sarwar, who is Muslim and was born in Scotland to Pakistani parents, said: “If what’s been reported is correct, then it is unacceptable and it’s horrific and we should call it out as such.
“But I think it’s important to stress that whatever people have agreements or disagreements on, individual things said by any individual, the broader kind of conversation around making sure our Scottish Government, or health boards, are complying with the Equality Act, is still important and isn’t negated.
“But on those individual comments, of course [they are] completely unacceptable.”
The Glasgow MSP added: “Those particular comments are horrific. As you would expect, I don’t find them acceptable and so we should call it out as such.”
A list of offensive jokes had been shared by Ms Peggie in a group chat with other nurses, mocking the victims of the Pakistani floods. Between June and October 2022, monsoon floods devastated the country and killed 1,700 people.
Witnesses also told the tribunal Ms Peggie would often use the slurs “P*ki” and “Ch*nky” and claimed she had said she wanted to post a packet of bacon through the letterbox of a mosque that was being built in Kirkcaldy.
Ms Peggie admitted the jokes were “distasteful”. Her lawyer Naomi Cunningham described them as a “thoroughly unpleasant sequence of jokes”.
Ms Peggie was re-questioned by the tribunal on Tuesday and defended sending the jokes, describing them as “dark humour” amongst friends.
She defended using the slurs as “normal words we used” growing up and said she had never had complaints from her Pakistani colleagues or Chinese neighbours.
The nurse also denied making the suggestion about posting bacon through the mosque’s letterbox. Ms Peggie then said she would treat all her patients the same, but she was scared of Shariah law and opposed illegal immigration.
The tribunal is due to resume for closing oral statements on September 1.
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