In what world is it acceptable for a man to describe a female colleague as a “f***ing mong” during a workplace argument?

The world we have created, apparently, according to an industrial tribunal.

A world where words and terms once considered outrageous profanities are common parlance and objectors are expected to suck it up.

Be careful what you wish for. How swiftly the f word has shifted from a shocking wince-making superfluous word to everyday language; from not so long ago, the punctuation of the inarticulate – dimbos who struggled to converse without swearing, or out to shock – to totally permissible in the workplace.

Unless your workplace is the Westminster bubble where swearing at a worker breaches Parliament’s bullying and harassment policy.

Two concurrent cases showed a rank double standards in society this week.

Reform UK MP Lee Anderson was ordered to apologise for breaching Parliament's bullying and harassment policy after he “verbally insulted” the guard twice when asked to show his pass as he tried to enter the Parliamentary estate in November 2023.

Anderson initially dismissed the allegations and called the investigation biased but later admitted using inappropriate language, citing “challenging personal circumstances” that day.

Following the ruling by the Independent Expert Panel, Anderson apologised to the Commons and the officer.

Meanwhile, 200 miles away up north in Manchester, tribunal judge Jetinder Shergill this week ruled that the sacking of a delivery driver for describing a female colleague as a “f***ing mong” during an argument about her weight was unfair dismissal because the f-word is so commonplace “in the public sphere, adding the caveat, particularly in the north of England.

No, the north is not a super-hotbed of profanity, every other region is as good at it too.

The woman – who said she felt “violated and shocked” and in tears after the “aggressive” onslaught in a conversation about attending a weight loss club and doughnuts - reported him to management Booker, which led to his sacking.

She said he had also said to her: “No wonder it takes you 19 weeks to lose a stone. It hasn’t taken me 19 weeks.”

However, the judge disagreed with his sacking and the driver will now receive compensation after his ruling that this workplace was “lawless and toxic” and rife with comments like this with a “dysfunctional” team withy managers who were “part of the problem”, said the judge. The sacking without warning was “harsh” and unfair, he said.

Presumably, the assumption here is that we all have a choice where we work and if the woman didn’t like the culture where this type of insult was perfectly normal, she should have left or challenged the culture and tried to change from within.

The judge did say that “swearing should not be acceptable in a workplace, although common everyday experience, particularly in the north, is that the F-word is used quite often, spoken in the public sphere.”

What about the insult thrown at the woman? Does this mean that, because she accepted a job in the business, she must accept what is thrown at her or quit.

In this case, it looks like the message was that the driver should have been given a warning and not sacked for the ‘offence’ and the ruling was against the management rather than condoning the behaviour.

However, the overriding message is that in businesses that have developed their own toxic culture, everyone in it must accept – and expect - the otherwise unacceptable behaviour - unless you’re protected in the Westminster bubble. That can never be right.

An uncomfortable precedent at best; a shocking plummeting of standards and expectations in reality. We should despair.

 

Before dawn on Tuesday, on a mini break in Southwold, my phone started to ping with messages from friends.

How could this be happening? Asked time and time again. What were Americans thinking?

Kamala Harris became the second woman to lose a presidential election to Donald J. Trump in a nation clearly not ready for a female president.

So many, men and women – which I find especially perplexing – want a leader who is bigoted and misogynistic. They clearly want a sexist nation and are comfortable with the result.

It is a difficult and hard pill to swallow but it is fact.

It’s now for the rest of the world to react to what Trump says and does. Other nations do not have to accept his attitude.

We do not have to travel and spend our money in a nation that accepts such views of its president.

Heartbreaking case

It was heart breaking to read how Norwich dog groomer Hayley Butcher died after having weight-loss surgery in Turkey.

At 40, she felt gastric sleeve surgery was her only choice and was given the all-clear to fly back to the UK just two days after her operation.

But complications of a bowel perforation and anastomotic leak discovered after she became ill back in the UK led to her death last month.

Why this beautiful woman described as happy go lucky, caring and was always worrying about other people felt she had to resort to the risk of surgery abroad may well come out in the inquest, but what a tragic loss of life, promise and love.

Too often the most outwardly happy and caring people are masking their own unhappiness at parts of their life. RIP Hayley.