President of the UK Supreme Court delivers SLS Centenary Lecture at the University of Essex

The School of Law was honoured to recently welcome Baroness Hale of Richmond DBE, known as Lady Hale, to deliver the latest instalment in the SLS Centenary Lecture series.

The SLS or Society of Legal Scholars, was founded in 1908 and is the foremost learned society for university law teachers in the United Kingdom and Ireland. It currently has over 3000 members. It will shortly be celebrating its 10 year anniversary. The Centenary Lecture Series was inaugurated ten years ago to celebrate the centenary.  Distinguished speakers have presented the annual lecture at various universities throughout the United Kingdom and Ireland.

Ahead of the lecture, Lady Hale and her husband Julian Farrand visited the Essex Law Clinic to meet students and staff including Clinic Supervisor, Liz Fisher-Frank, and former student director and now Clinic Administrator, Daria Dlugosz. Lady Hale learned how the clinic, established in 2008, provides legal advice to local people who cannot afford legal services but who generally don't qualify for legal aid, while giving Essex students invaluable experience of working alongside practising lawyers.

Commenting on her visit, Clinic Supervisor, Liz Fisher-Frank said: “It was an absolute privilege to both welcome Lady Hale into the law clinic and to hear her thoughts and comments about the law and her exceptional career in it. This provided a totally fantastic opportunity for law clinic students and staff to engage with and learn from such a knowledgeable, interesting and inspiring person.”

Professor Richard Taylor, President of the SLS started proceedings, followed by Lady Hale presenting her talk on ‘All Human Beings? Reflections on the 70th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights’. Richard said that this was the largest audience that he had seen for any of the lectures in the series.

Professor Karen Hulme, Head of the School of Law said: ‘It was our pleasure to host Lady Hale for the 2018 SLS Centenary Lecture. She drew upon a wealth of legal authorities to present a thorough landscape of the human rights issues facing vulnerable persons in UK society today. Lady Hale was exceptionally generous with her time, engaging in discussions with our staff and students during the day, and she was received very warmly by the appreciative students in attendance.’