The Rt. Hon. The Baroness Carr of Walton-on-the-Hill – President

The Right Honourable the Baroness Carr of Walton-on-the-Hill was called to the Bar by the Inner Temple in 1987. As a barrister she specialised in general commercial law and took silk in 2003. She became chair of the Education and Training Committee of the Inner Temple, where she became a Governing Bencher in 2006; and head of chambers. In 2007 she became Chair of the Professional Negligence Bar Association, Chair of the Bar Standards Board Conduct Committee in 2008, and was appointed as the Complaints Commissioner to the International Criminal Court in the Hague in 2011.

She was Director of Magistrates’ Training and a member of the Judicial College Board between 2014 and 2018, and a Presider of the Midland Circuit, the largest Circuit outside London and the South East, from 2016 to 2020. In 2016 she was presented with the European Women in Business Law Lifetime Achievement Award.

She was elevated to the Court of Appeal in 2020. She was appointed as the Senior Judicial Commissioner and Vice Chair of the Judicial Appointments Commission shortly thereafter, remaining in that role until January 2023. She was a temporary Investigatory Powers Commissioner during the Covid-19 pandemic. She became President of the Professional Negligence Bar Association in 2022.

She became Lady Chief Justice of England and Wales on 1 October 2023. As Lady Chief Justice, she will be the President of the Courts of England and Wales and Head of the Judiciary of England and Wales. She is the 98th person to hold this historic office and the first woman.