The Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers | |||||||||
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President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom | |||||||||
In office 1 October 2009 –30 September 2012 | |||||||||
Nominated by | Jack Straw | ||||||||
Appointed by | Elizabeth II | ||||||||
Deputy | The Lord Hope of Craighead | ||||||||
Preceded by | Office created | ||||||||
Succeeded by | The Lord Neuberger of Abbotsbury | ||||||||
Senior Lord of Appeal in Ordinary | |||||||||
In office 1 October 2008 –30 September 2009 | |||||||||
Deputy | The Lord Hoffmann The Lord Hope of Craighead | ||||||||
Preceded by | The Lord Bingham of Cornhill | ||||||||
Succeeded by | Office abolished | ||||||||
Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales | |||||||||
In office 3 October 2005 –30 September 2008 | |||||||||
Nominated by | Lord Falconer | ||||||||
Appointed by | Elizabeth II | ||||||||
Preceded by | The Lord Woolf | ||||||||
Succeeded by | The Lord Judge | ||||||||
Master of the Rolls | |||||||||
In office 6 June 2000 –3 October 2005 | |||||||||
Preceded by | The Lord Woolf | ||||||||
Succeeded by | The Lord Clarke of Stone-cum-Ebony | ||||||||
Lord of Appeal in Ordinary | |||||||||
In office 12 January 1999 –6 June 2000 | |||||||||
Preceded by | The Lord Lloyd of Berwick | ||||||||
Succeeded by | The Lord Scott of Foscote | ||||||||
Non-Permanent Judge of the Court of Final Appeal of Hong Kong | |||||||||
In office 1 October 2012 –30 September 2024 | |||||||||
Appointed by | Leung Chun-ying | ||||||||
Personal details | |||||||||
Born | [1] | 21 January 1938||||||||
Nationality | British | ||||||||
Spouse | Christylle Marie-Thérèse Rouffiac | ||||||||
Children | 2,including Marie | ||||||||
Residence(s) | Hampstead,London | ||||||||
Alma mater | King's College,Cambridge | ||||||||
Chinese name | |||||||||
Chinese | 范 理 申 | ||||||||
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Nicholas Addison Phillips,Baron Phillips of Worth Matravers, KG , GBS , PC [2] (born 21 January 1938) is a British former senior judge.
Phillips was the inaugural President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom,holding office between October 2009 and October 2012. He was the last Senior Lord of Appeal in Ordinary and the first Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales to be head of the English judiciary when that function was transferred from the Lord Chancellor in April 2006. [3] Before his chief justiceship,he was Master of the Rolls from 2000 to 2005. He sits as a crossbencher.
Phillips was born 21 January 1938. He was educated at Bryanston School (where he was appointed a governor of the school in 1975,he has been chairman of its governors since 1981). He undertook National Service with the Royal Navy and the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve,being commissioned as an officer. [4]
After two years' military service he went to King's College,Cambridge,where he read law. In 1962,he was called to the Bar at the Middle Temple,where he was a Harmsworth Scholar. He undertook pupillage at 2 Essex Court Chambers (with the Anglo-American QC,Waldo Porges) and subsequently obtained a tenancy there,later moving to 1 Brick Court (now Brick Court Chambers). In 1973,he was appointed as Junior Counsel to the Ministry of Defence and to the Treasury in Maritime and Admiralty matters. On 4 April 1978,he became Queen's Counsel. [5]
In 1982,Phillips was appointed a Recorder and from 1987 was a full-time High Court Judge on the Queen's Bench Division,with the customary knighthood. [4] He took an interest in legal training,and was Chairman of the Council of Legal Education from 1992 to 1997. [4] He presided over several complex fraud trials including those covering the Robert Maxwell pension fund fraud and Barlow Clowes. [6] In 1995,he became a Lord Justice of Appeal and was appointed to the Privy Council. [4]
On 12 January 1999,he was appointed a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary [7] and created a Life Peer under the Appellate Jurisdiction Act 1876 as Baron Phillips of Worth Matravers ,of Belsize Park in the London Borough of Camden. [8]
He then succeeded Harry,Lord Woolf as Master of the Rolls on 6 June 2000. [9] He conducted an inquiry into the outbreak of bovine spongiform encephalopathy. [10] He served as Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales from 2005 to 2008,when he was reappointed as a Law Lord. [4]
Since 2008,Phillips was the Senior Lord of Appeal in Ordinary until he became the first president of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom on 1 October 2009. [4]
Queen Elizabeth II elevated him as a Knight Companion of the Order of the Garter on 23 April 2011. [11]
On 11 October 2011,Phillips announced his retirement on 30 September 2012,almost four months before the mandatory retirement age for British judges at turning 75 on 21 January 2013. [12]
After retiring from the bench,Phillips followed Woolf as president of the Qatar International Court at Doha [13] He served on the court from 2012 to 2018. [4] He also acts as an arbitrator. [6]
In March 2012,the Government of Hong Kong SAR appointed Phillips as a Non-Permanent Judge of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal. [4] He also serves as President of the British Maritime Law Association and Chairman of the European Maritime Law Organisation. [14] [4]
On 30 September 2024,Lord Phillips announced that he will step down as a non-permanent judge of Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal after the end of his term on that day,due to personal reasons. [15]
Phillips is married to Christylle Marie-Thérèse Rouffiac,and lives in Hampstead,London. One of his two children is novelist Marie Phillips.
Phillips is a member of Brooks's and the Garrick Clubs. [4] He was also appointed the inaugural Distinguished Fellow and visiting professor of The Dickson Poon School of Law,King's College London. [16]
He received honorary degrees of Doctor of Laws (Hon. LLD) from Exeter (1998),Birmingham (2003),London (2004),Wake Forest University (2010),and the International Institute of Maritime Law,and of Doctor of Civil Law (Hon. DCL) from City University,London (2003). [4]
Phillips served as Chancellor of Bournemouth University from 2009 until 2018,being succeeded by broadcaster and author Kate Adie. [17]
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Decided cases
Thomas Henry Bingham,Baron Bingham of Cornhill,was a British judge who was successively Master of the Rolls,Lord Chief Justice and Senior Law Lord. On his death in 2010,he was described as the greatest judge of his generation. The Baroness Hale of Richmond observed that his pioneering role in the formation of the United Kingdom Supreme Court may be his most important and long-lasting legacy. The Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers regarded Bingham as "one of the two great legal figures of my lifetime in the law". The Lord Hope of Craighead described Bingham as "the greatest jurist of our time".
Harry Kenneth Woolf,Baron Woolf is a British life peer and retired barrister and judge. He was Master of the Rolls from 1996 until 2000 and Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales from 2000 until 2005. The Constitutional Reform Act 2005 made him the first Lord Chief Justice to be President of the Courts of England and Wales. He was a Non-Permanent Judge of the Court of Final Appeal of Hong Kong from 2003 to 2012. He sits in the House of Lords as a crossbencher.
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Anthony Peter Clarke,Baron Clarke of Stone-cum-Ebony,is a British lawyer. He was one of the first 11 Supreme Court of the United Kingdom Justices and was the first High Court judge to be appointed directly to that court when it came into existence on 1 October 2009 without previously having sat as a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary. He was appointed to the Court of Final Appeal of Hong Kong on 11 April 2011 as a non-permanent judge. He was previously Master of the Rolls and Head of Civil Justice in England and Wales. He retired from the Supreme Court in September 2017.
David Edmond Neuberger,Baron Neuberger of Abbotsbury is an English judge. He served as President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom from 2012 to 2017. He was a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary until the House of Lords' judicial functions were transferred to the new Supreme Court in 2009,at which point he became Master of the Rolls,the second most senior judge in England and Wales. Neuberger was appointed to the Supreme Court,as its President,in 2012. He now serves as a Non-Permanent Judge of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal and formerly served as the Chair of the High-Level Panel of Legal Experts on Media Freedom. He was appointed to the Singapore International Commercial Court as from 2018.
Robert Walker,Baron Walker of Gestingthorpe,,was a British barrister and Justice of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom. He served as a Non-Permanent Judge of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal between 2009 and 2023.
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The Vice-President of the Civil Division is a Court of Appeal Judge who assists the Master of the Rolls in leading the Civil Division of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales. The power to appoint a vice-president was created by the Senior Courts Act 1981,but was not exercised until Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers was appointed Master of the Rolls in 2000. Because Lord Phillips was in the process of completing the inquiry into the bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) outbreak,he appointed Sir Martin Nourse the first vice-president so he could serve as Acting Master of the Rolls.
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Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers, President of The Supreme Court, 2009–12, 76