The Faculty of Law is delighted to record the nomination of the Right Honourable Igor, Baron Judge of Draycote, Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales, President of the Selden Society, for the conferment of the honorary degree of Doctor of Law by the University of Cambridge, at a congregation to be held on 20 June 2012.
Lord Judge read history and law at Magdalene College, Cambridge, where he was elected an honorary fellow in 2008, and has for many years been a regular and welcome visitor to the Faculty.
He was called to the Bar by the Middle Temple in 1963 and was appointed Queen’s Counsel in 1979. A High Court judge in the Queen’s Bench Division from 1988 to 1996, he was appointed to the Court of Appeal in 1996, and was Senior Presiding Judge for England and Wales between 1998 and 2003, when he became Deputy Chief Justice of England and Wales. Upon the reorganisation of the judiciary following the Constitutional Reform Act 2005 he became the first President of the Queen’s Bench Division, holding that office until his appointment as Lord Chief Justice in 2008, in succession to the Right Honourable Lord Phillips.
He is a long-standing member of the Selden Society, founded in 1887 by F.W. Maitland and others to encourage the study and advance the knowledge of the history of English law, and succeeded Sir James Holt as President of the Society in 2007.