Chancellor, The Right Honourable the Baroness Hale of Richmond
The Chancellor of the University is elected by Court on the nomination of Council. He or she is the ceremonial head of the University, confers degrees at graduation events, chairs Court, supports fundraising efforts, serves as the most senior public face of the University and is a source of wise counsel to the institution. (The Vice-Chancellor, Professor Eric Thomas, is the University's chief executive and academic leader.)
The Right Honourable the Baroness Hale of Richmond was officially installed as the University's seventh Chancellor on 12 March 2004, succeeding Sir Jeremy Morse who retired at the end of 2003.
Lady Hale became one of the UK's 12 Law Lords in January 2004 - the only woman ever to hold such a position.
She studied Law at Cambridge and received a starred First for exceptional distinction in that subject. In 1966 she became an academic at the University of Manchester, eventually specialising in social welfare and family law. She also studied at the Bar, topping the list in the Bar finals in 1968 and then practising part time as a barrister.
In 1984, Brenda Hale became the youngest person and the first woman ever to be appointed to the Law Commission. Over the course of a decade she instigated a number of key reforms. She led the work that produced the Children Act 1989 - a radical re-casting of the relationship between parents, children and the State - and the important domestic violence legislation that formed part of the Family Law Act 1996. She was appointed a Queen's Counsel in 1989, a High Court judge in 1994 (the first to be appointed from academia) and a Lady Justice of Appeal in 1999 - only the second woman to reach that position.
Lady Hale is a visiting fellow at Nuffield College, Oxford and visiting professor at King's College, London, as well as an honorary fellow at Girton, her old Cambridge college. She has worked closely with University of Bristol academics on family law, child protection and other socio-legal matters. The University made her an honorary Doctor of Laws in 2002.
Life notes
- Born in Yorkshire. Both parents were teachers.
- Read Law at Girton College, Cambridge. Took a starred First and the University prize for Roman Law.
- 1966: became a lecturer in Law at the University of Manchester. (Spent 18 years as an academic, publishing various books on family and mental health law.)
- 1968: topped the list in the Bar finals and began practising part time as a barrister.
- 1984: became the youngest person and the first woman ever to be appointed to the Law Commission; started sitting as an Assistant Recorder.
- 1989: appointed a Recorder and Queen's Counsel.
- 1994: became a High Court judge - the first to be appointed from academia rather than the legal profession.
- 1999: became only the second woman ever to be appointed to the Court of Appeal. Given the Exceptional Woman Lawyer Achievement Award.
- 2002: awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws by the University of Bristol.
- 2004: became the first woman Law Lord, as well as Chancellor of the University of Bristol.
Contact
You may contact the Chancellor through Hugh Martin, Head of Secretariat.