School sacked worker ‘ after Facebook posts over LGBT teaching’

A SCHOOL fired a Christian employee because she shared posts on Facebook criticising the teaching of LGBT relationships to young children, and not because of her religious beliefs, an employment tribunal has heard.

Kristie Higgs, 44, was dismissed for gross misconduct by Farmor’s School in Fairford, Gloucestershire, last year after sharing two Facebook posts to around 100 people in her network.

The posts raised concerns about relationship education at her son’s Church of England primary school, which was to teach the No Outsiders in Our School programme.

In one Facebook post, Mrs Higgs urged people to sign an online petition against making relationship education mandatory.

In another, she shared an article about the rise of transgender ideology in children’s books in American schools.

One anonymous Facebook friend of Mrs Higgs complained in October 2018 to the school, where she worked as a pastoral assistant.

Mrs Higgs, who posted under her maiden name, was suspended by the school’s head and following a disciplinary process was sacked.

The Christian Legal Centre is supporting Mrs Higgs and lawyers are arguing her sacking breached her freedom of speech and freedom of religion.

School governor Stephen Conlan, who chaired the disciplinary panel, said she was dismissed because of the language used in the posts.

Mr Conlan, an employment lawyer, told the tribunal in Bristol: “We were not concerned with Mrs Higgs’s religious beliefs. We were concerned with the manner in which those beliefs were expressed.”

The hearing continues.