Ten brave women still need your help to bring a ground breaking court case that could change employment tribunals forever

Stormy scene around tilted scales of justice as judges avoid complaints

Remember the ten brave women I wrote about who are challenging the bullying behaviour of Employment Judge Philip Lancaster? See my blog here. The ones the justice system refused to investigate despite overwhelming evidence?

They’re now in a race against time – and the Judicial Conduct Information Office is playing its oldest trick: delay, delay, delay until they run out of money or miss their deadline.

Here’s what’s happening:

The women issued their Letter Before Action to the Judicial Conduct Investigation Office (JCIO) in September. The JCIO’s deadline to respond under the pre-action protocol was 8 October. They missed it. The women waited another week. They missed that too.

Now the JCIO says they won’t respond until 20 October – leaving barely two weeks before the women must file at court in early November or lose their right to bring these proceedings forever.

Classic establishment tactics. Unlimited taxpayer funding and government lawyers versus women running on crowdfunding and determination.

But here’s why this matters more than ever:

In September 2025, Baroness Harriet Harman KC published a damning report on judicial misconduct. Her conclusions are devastating:

“The problem is the culture of impunity for those at the top who commit misconduct. Those in powerful positions whether at the Bar or in the judiciary who choose to engage in bullying, harassment or sexual harassment can be pretty confident that nothing will be done about it. And that is what must change.”

She identified a “cohort of untouchables” amongst the judiciary and “particular judges who are widely known for making everyone’s lives a misery.”

This is EXACTLY what these women are fighting to expose.

The women need £40,000 total to see this through

They’ve raised £17,335 so far – incredible progress from 472 supporters. But they need £40,000 in total to get this case into court and finish what they’ve started.

Their legal team of outstanding women lawyers at Deighton Pierce Glynn has already slashed fees dramatically. But even at reduced rates, taking on the government is expensive.

What’s at stake:

• 35,000+ employment tribunal users face these tribunals every year
• If this judicial review succeeds, the JCIO will be forced to properly investigate judicial misconduct
• Judges who egregiously abuse their power and block the release of the court record will finally face consequences
• Whistleblowers will be better protected

This isn’t about these women and whistleblowers getting compensation – their chance at justice has been lost forever. If they win the judicial reivew there won’t be any compensation – just the knowledge that they exposed a corrupt complaint system. And showing judges that they are not above the law.

How to donate:

Go to: https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/exposing-judge-lancaster/

Every pound counts. They cannot let the judicial establishment win by simply outlasting them financially. Not when they’re this close.

Please help them as they have shown remarkable courage and integrity to do this for the greater good but they can’t do it without further financial help.

#bullying #employmentTribunals #judgePhilipLancaster #judicialConductInvestigationOffice

The Black Hole of Accountability: Employment Judges Block Evidence in Their Own Misconduct Cases

Judge Barry Clarke who is president of employment tribunals in England and Wales

The English and Welsh Employment Tribunal system is operating under an extraordinary contradiction that strikes at the heart of judicial accountability: judges accused of misconduct can legally withhold the only evidence that exists against them.

This isn’t a bureaucratic quirk. It’s a fundamental breach of justice that’s destroying lives and making a mockery of the complaints system.

The Case That Exposes Everything

Employment Judge Philip Lancaster faces multiple misconduct complaints from whistleblowers, including Sellafield Whistleblower, Alison McDermott, and many others. The evidence needed to investigate these complaints? The judge’s own handwritten notes from the hearings in question.

Here’s where it gets explosive: Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood has confirmed to MPs that where no audio recording exists, these judges’ notes constitute the official court record.

Yet Lancaster refuses to release the official court record. The very judicial notes that the Justice Secretary says are the official record. The only evidence that exists of what happened in his courtroom.

In other words, the judge accused of multiple breaches of misconduct and betraying his judicial oath has become the sole gatekeeper of the evidence against himself.

A System Designed to Block Scrutiny

Let’s be absolutely clear about what’s happening here. No other professional under investigation could do this:

• Police officers can’t withhold bodycam footage when under investigation
• Civil servants can’t lock away departmental emails
• Politicians can’t refuse to release official documents
• Doctors can’t refuse to release patient notes

But Employment Tribunal judges can — and do — withhold their notes – the only record of proceedings, even when facing serious misconduct allegations and even though the Justice Secretary has categorically confirmed that the judicial notes are the official court record.

The President’s Defensive Wall

When I pressed Judge Barry Clarke, President of the Employment Tribunal, for answers to this blatant unfairness, the response was revealing. I asked  direct questions:

Does he accept that judges’ notes are the official record, as stated by the Justice Secretary?

If yes, what legal authority allows Lancaster to withhold them?

If no, who can intervene?

Instead of answers, I received pages of case law about judicial independence — a concept that was never meant to shield judges from accountability when facing misconduct investigations.  Clarke’s office has chosen to defend a practice that subverts open justice rather than confront a shocking flaw that undermines the entire tribunal system.

Clarke defended the practice as a matter of “judicial discretion.” But this is precisely the problem: access to the official court record should never be discretionary. It should be an absolute right. In every other court in the land, parties can obtain transcripts, recordings, or official records of proceedings. But in the Employment Tribunal, Clarke has normalised a system where individual judges become personal owners of public records, free to release or suppress them as they see fit. This isn’t about protecting judicial independence — it’s about placing judges above the law.

The fact that Clarke sees nothing wrong with a judge under investigation controlling access to evidence against himself reveals how deeply this corruption has infected the tribunal system. When the President himself cannot grasp that court records belong to the public, not to individual judges, we’re no longer talking about reform. We’re talking about a system that needs to be torn down and rebuilt from scratch.

“This Is Not Justice — It’s a Travesty”

For Alison McDermott, the Sellafield whistleblower, who is leading a judicial review against Employment Judge Lancaster, the situation is both personal and devastating:

“I was horrified to discover my hearing was not recorded. No audio, no video — nothing. Judge Lancaster, who is facing multiple charges of misconduct, is refusing to release the very evidence that could prove it. In any other profession, this would be seen as obstructing evidence. In the Employment Tribunal, they call it standard practice. We’re not asking for special treatment. We’re simply asking for the official court record of our own hearing. But in Britain’s tribunals, the accused judge gets to be the gatekeeper. When judges can keep secret notes, and then withhold those notes when under investigation, we don’t have a justice system. We have a closed shop where judges police themselves. .This is not justice.  It is disgusting perversion of justice and a travesty that denies any possibility of a fair trial.”

The Deeper Rot

This scandal reveals three interconnected failures that should alarm anyone who believes in the rule of law:

First, many Employment Tribunals don’t record their proceedings. In an age where every high street shop has CCTV, our tribunals rely solely on judges’ handwritten notes — notes taken by people who receive no training in accurate record-keeping and face no monitoring of their note-taking abilities.

Second, these unverified notes become the official court record. Your career, your reputation, your access to justice — all hang on a judge’s personal scribbles. Yet you are denied access to them.

Third, when that judge faces investigation, they alone decide whether anyone can see those notes. The accused becomes the gate keeper of the very evidence needed to prove misconduct.

Why This Matters Beyond One Case

This isn’t simply about Judge Lancaster. It’s about a system that has abandoned its most basic principle: open justice. The latest annual report from the Judicial Appointments and Conduct Ombudsman – see here – show that there were 424 complaints against judges last financial year where people contacted the Ombudsman because they were dissatisfied. Of course only a few – 23 – were investigated – the vast majority being thrown out often because it breached the three month time limit for complaints to be heard.

Regional Judges and the President of the Employment Tribunal have also applied this three month deadline rigidly, striking out cases before their substance can even be tested. Campaigners say the effect is to silence victims and protect those in positions of power. And now Baroness Harriet Harman agrees.

Harriet Harman’s Independent Review of Bullying, Harassment and Sexual Harassment at the Bar [see here]was blunt about the flaws. In paragraph 34 she wrote: “There is no benefit in restricting complaints arbitrarily. Indeed, the only practical benefit it has is to protect those engaging in misconduct.” She added it was “surprising that the judiciary confirmed the reasonableness of this time limit after reviewing it as part of the consultation on judicial discipline in 2023.”

Courts must be open to scrutiny. Proceedings must be transparent. The court record. must be accessible. These aren’t optional extras — they’re the key foundations that separate justice from an abuse of arbitrary power.

The Question That Demands an Answer

Either the Justice Secretary is right that judges’ notes are the official court record — in which case Lancaster’s refusal to release them is a scandal that should trigger immediate intervention — or she has misled MPs about how the tribunal system actually works.

There is no third option.

The government cannot claim these notes are the official record while simultaneously allowing judges to treat them as private property, especially when facing misconduct investigations.

A System in Crisis

A tribunal system that allows judges to withhold evidence against themselves cannot command public confidence. A President who defends this practice rather than reforming it has failed in his duty. A Justice Secretary who knows this is happening but doesn’t act has abandoned her responsibility.

The principle is devastatingly simple: without access to the court record, there can be no proper appeals, no effective complaints process, and no real justice.

Until this changes, the Employment Tribunal will remain what it has become: a system where judges facing serious allegations can simply make the evidence disappear.

That’s not judicial independence. It’s judicial impunity.

And in a democracy that claims to value the rule of law, it’s completely unacceptable.

The full letter from his office is here if you want to read it.

Also it is essential to help fund the judicial review so it can reach its £30,000 target. The link to donate is https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/exposing-judge-lancaster/

Make a one-time donation

Your contribution is appreciated.

Donate

Make a monthly donation

Your contribution is appreciated.

Donate monthly

Make a yearly donation

Your contribution is appreciated.

Donate yearly

You can donate via PayPal via this link

https://www.paypal.com/ncp/payment/865JAS3QJ3CGQ

#courtRecords #employmentTribunals #humanRights #judgeBarryClarke #judgePhilipLancaster #JudicialAppointmentsAndConductOmbudsman #law

Judge Lancaster’s dismissal of top cardiologist’s safety concerns helped health trust cover up heart patient deaths

Judge Lancaster – the same judge who vilified the now vindicated Alison McDermott- a Sellafield whistleblower over bullying and nuclear safety issues

Judge Philip Lancaster – the controversial employment judge – already facing 16 complaints – nearly all from women – about his handling of their tribunal cases – has now been revealed as having helped a health trust to cover up patient deaths.

An investigation by Michael Buchanan, the BBC’s social affairs correspondent, released yesterday revealed that police are investigating heart patient deaths at Castle Hill Hospital near Hull. His full report which contains disturbing treatment of patients and a “cover up” of the circumstances of their deaths from relatives is here.

The employment tribunal case heard by Judge Lancaster centred around the safety of a procedure called Trans-Catheter-Aortic Valve Implantation (TAVI) – a keyhole surgery method to replace a defective aortic valve in the heart to predominately elderly patients,

The case had been bought against Hull University Teaching Hospitals Trust by consultant cardiologist Dr Thanjavur Bragadeesh, then clinical director of the hospital’s cardiology department, because he had raised safety concerns about the implementation of the procedure which had led to patients deaths.

Dr Bragadeesh

He had first raised the issue in 2020 to little effect and took the trust to the tribunal as a whistleblower in 2023. In fact he was demoted following raising the issues.

Ranged against him were the trust’s chief medical officer, Dr Makani Purva and three consultant colleagues, Dr.Joseph John, Dr Kumar Chelliah and Dr Manish Ramlall.

He brought 29 claims of detriment and 13 protective disclosures. All detriment claims were dismissed by Judge Lancaster as either being out of time or failed claims which were legally irrelevant.

As a result it was never publicly revealed until yesterday by the BBC that at least 11 patients died following procedural failures, with some death certificates failing to mention the surgery at all. Families were never told the truth. Independent reviews confirmed catastrophic decision-making and a mortality rate three times the national average.

Despite Dr. Bragadeesh’s concerns being validated by external reviews, including those by the Royal College of Physicians, the tribunal did not adequately engage with this substantive evidence. The failure to consider corroborative findings from reputable bodies suggests a potential bias in favour of the employer and a reluctance to hold the institution accountable.

Certainly the Judge Lancaster’s judgement reflects this highlighting similar omissions and gas lighting of whistleblowers as seen in other judgements – notably Judge Tony Hyams Parish ignoring the General Medical Council’s revalidation of whistleblower Dr Usha Prasad, then a cardiologist at Epsom and St Helier Trust and the avoidable death of a heart patient. And Dr Bragadeesh is described as having a ” bullying and undermining attitude” to other consultants – just as Dr Martyn Pitman, the obstetrician, who raised patient safety issues in the maternity services at Hampshire Hospitals NHS trust, was portrayed when he lost his tribunal case.

Alison McDermott

Yesterday also saw the damning findings of the Commons Public Accounts committee on Sellafield which showed that Sellafield had paid out £377,000 to staff to end labour disputes and had issued 16 non disclosure agreements to staff to cover up complaints. This vindicated Alison McDermott’s portrayal of the place at risk over nuclear safety and a bullying culture.

Still Sellafield and the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority are using the findings of Judge Lancaster’s flawed judgements to gaslight her.

In a joint public statement they said: “This case has been thoroughly litigated through an Employment Tribunal, Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) and the Court of Appeal. It was found that the claims made against Sellafield Ltd in this case were entirely without substance, and there was no basis for claims against the NDA.”

Try telling that to the MPs who wrote the report on Sellafield who say they are not convinced by claims that everything is OK or to the Department for Energy who admonished both organisations and said they must crack down on bullying.

There is a much wider issue to all of this. It is the question of the public accountability. Judge Lancaster is being protected by the Judicial Conduct Investigations Office. Despite a growing pile of complaints from women and from Dr Bragadeesh about his behaviour at tribunal hearings, it refuses to act on any of them. It is also fighting the Information Commissioner to prevent the public and press being able to put in any freedom of information requests.

By doing so they risk bringing the judicial system into disrepute and in my view they lack a moral compass.

If they continue to do this, they are acting as a party to suppressing patient safety in the National Health Service and in the case of Sellafield, because it is such a contaminated and dangerous place, putting the general public at risk.

Baroness Sue Carr, the Lady Chief Justice, and Shabana Mahmood, the Lord Chancellor, who both receive advice from the JCIO, should be wary about ignoring these developments, because at some stage they are going to come back and bite them.

Make a one-time donation

Your contribution is appreciated.

Donate

Make a monthly donation

Your contribution is appreciated.

Donate monthly

Make a yearly donation

Your contribution is appreciated.

Donate yearly

Please donate to Westminster Confidential

£10.00

Click here to purchase.

#cardiology #drBragadeesh #HullUniversityHospitalsNHSTrust #judgePhilipLancaster #JudicialConductInvestigationsOffice #news #Sellafield

An appeal for ten brave women who want to challenge a bullying employment judge

Judge Philip Lancaster

I don’t usually run appeals for money on my blog but I am making an exception in this case because of the huge injustice in the employment tribunal system that allows some judges to insult, berate and patronise women who come before them.

if you want to donate this is the link. DO NOT CLICK ON THE YELLOW BUTTON ON TOP OF THE PAGE WHERE IT SAYS DONATE – as this will go to the general fund for the Good Law Project and not to the women. INSTEAD SCROLL DOWN AND CLICK ON DONATE BY CARD.

To do so they have to get a judicial review against the Judicial Conduct Investigation Office which is both refusing to investigate their complaints and ironically believes it is above our freedom of information laws so it doesn’t have to answer any questions from the press or the public on simple facts like how many complaints there have been against judges. This view is not shared by the Information Commissioner who ruled it should comply with FOI but the Ministry of Justice is planning to appeal this decision.

The case the women want to bring is not just against the bullying Judge Philip Lancaster – but against the whole employment tribunal system which doesn’t allow access to judges’ notes and does not produce court records for all cases and even when it does makes sure it is very expensive to get hold of them.

The women’s case has been taken up by the Good Law Project but the women still have to raise some £13,OOO to cover legal opinions. So far they have raised just over £5000. The case was covered by me in Byline Times here. Now it has been taken up by the BBC programme Look North.

You can see their report below.

BBC Look North coverage of the complaints against Judge Lancaster with interviews with Alison McDermott and Dr Hinaa Toheed.

The treatment of management and diversity consultant Alison Mcdermott, by Sellafield who spent £750,000 on top flight lawyers to oppose her claim at an employment tribunal presided over by judge Lancaster led to her local MP Anna Dixon to request an apology from Sellafield’s chief Euan Hutton at a recent Parliamentary hearing. None was forthcoming.
Dr Hinnha Toheed, a GP, tells how she was shouted at 16 times by Judge Lancaster during a maternity discrimination hearing
She says: “Judge Lancaster shouted at me 16 times, called my case an “omnishambles” before we had even begun, and showed open bias and contempt throughout the hearing. The experience was devastating. My barrister formally documented his behaviour and submitted a written statement to support my complaint. Yet despite this evidence, the system protected him — and he remains in post to this day.”

She is one of two doctors and a nurse who have put in complaints about Judge Lancaster.

These women need support to get to the position of bringing a judicial review because of the enormous cost of doing so – another barrier against people being able to challenge the judiciary. Their legal team include Emily Soothill of Deighton Pierce Glynn, Dr. Charlotte Proudman, and a prominent King’s Counsel have agreed to capped fees. But they need this money to be able to pay for this advice – and that is why there is a need for this crowdfunder.

II have chosen not to call for any donations for my site on this blog so the money can go direct to the women.

#AlisonMcdermott #crowdfunding #judgePhilipLancaster #judicialConductInvestigationOffice #truth