Brenda Marjorie Hale[6] was born on 31 January 1945 in Leeds, West Riding of Yorkshire. Both her parents were headteachers. She has two sisters. Hale lived in Redcar until the age of three when she moved with her parents to Richmond, North Yorkshire. She was educated at the Richmond High School for Girls (now part of Richmond School), where she and her two sisters were all head girls.[7] She later studied at Girton College, Cambridge (the first from her school to attend Cambridge), where she read law. Hale was one of six women in her class, which had 110 men, and graduated with a starred first and top of her class in 1966.[8][9]
After becoming an assistant law lecturer at the Victoria University of Manchester (now the University of Manchester) in 1966 and lecturer in 1968, she was called to the Bar by Gray's Inn in 1969, topping the list in the bar finals for that year.[8][9][10]
Working part-time as a barrister, Hale spent 18 years mostly in academia, becoming Reader in 1981 and Professor of Law at Manchester in 1986.[10] Two years earlier, she became the first woman and youngest person to be appointed to the Law Commission, overseeing a number of important reforms[11] in family law during her nine years with the commission. In 1989, she was appointed Queen's Counsel.[8]
On 21 March 2018, the Hong Kong judiciary announced her nomination as a non-permanent judge from other common law jurisdictions of the Court of Final Appeal. Her appointment was accompanied by the appointments of Andrew Cheung and Beverley McLachlin.[22] The appointment was gazetted by the Chief Executive of Hong KongCarrie Lam and took effect 30 July 2018 for a three-year term.[23]
In October 2020, after China imposing a controversial national security law on Hong Kong, Lady Hale expressed her concerns about hearing cases in Hong Kong: "I have never sat and it has not been arranged at least for me to sit . . . when that happened I would have a serious moral question to ask myself."[24]
In June 2021, she revealed her wish of not wanting to be reappointed as a judge in Hong Kong after her three-year term ending in July. As she was making her decision known before a webinar, she also mentioned the impact of the security law and said, 'The jury is out on how they will be able to operate the new national security law. There are all sorts of question marks up in the air.'[25] However, the Hong Kong Judiciary claimed that her leaving was for personal reasons.[26][27]
Lady Hale became the first senior British judge to quit Hong Kong's top court after her fellow judge, Australian James Spigelman, resigned as a Hong Kong judge in November 2020.[28]
House of Lords
Lady Hale became a member of the House of Lords following her appointment as a law lord,[13] and was introduced to the Lords on 12 January 2004.[29]
In September 2023, Lady Hale was identified by The Guardian as one of eleven peers who had not sworn or affirmed the oath of allegiance to King Charles III and could not sit or vote in the House of Lords until they had done so.[30] Describing her appointment as a law lord, Hale stated: "I do not accept that I have neglected any 'duties' because I was not appointed as a parliamentarian", and planned to "play a modest part" in the Lords, having retired from judicial office.[30] She made her maiden speech on 23 November 2023, citing "the disruption caused by Covid and [her] own diffidence about whether [she] could make a useful contribution" for not having participated in parliamentary debates since her retirement as a judge.[31]
Significant lectures
On 27 June 2011, Lady Hale gave a lecture in memory of Sir Henry Hodge, "Equal Access to Justice in the Big Society" in which she explains the benefits of an inquisitorial Tribunal system over adversarial proceedings.[32]
On 10 September 2015, Lady Hale delivered the Caldwell Public Lecture at the University of Melbourne, Australia, on the topic "Protecting Human Rights in the UK Courts: What are we doing wrong?".[33]
On 2 November 2018, Lady Hale delivered an SLS Centenary Lecture at the University of Essex, United Kingdom, on the topic of "All Human Beings? Reflection on the 70th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights".
On 7 March 2019, Lady Hale delivered the University of Cambridge Freshfields law lecture, which she entitled "Principle and Pragmatism in Developing Private Law".[34]
In a 2019 Girton College lecture entitled "100 Years of Women in Law",[35][36] Lady Hale described the "Brenda Agenda" (a neologism coined by her Supreme Court colleague Lord Hope) as "quite simply, the belief that women are equal to men and should enjoy the same rights and freedoms that they do; but that women's lives are necessarily sometimes different from men's and the experience of leading those lives is just as valid and important in shaping the law as is the experience of men's lives."[37]
In June 2024, Lady Hale lectured a large audience at Conway Hall organised by Humanists UK and My Death, My Decision, in which she referred to the law preventing medically assisted euthanasia (assisted dying) as "cruel". This was her first public intervention on the subject since she gave a dissenting opinion in support of the claimant in R (Nicklinson) v Ministry of Justice a decade previously.[38][39]
She received an Honorary Fellowship from Bristol University in July 2017. An Honorary Fellowship is the highest honour the university can bestow.[41]
She received the Hibernian Law Medal from the Law Society of Ireland on 12 May 2022 for outstanding contributions to the advancement of justice, integrity of the rule of law, independence of the judiciary and the legal professions, and/or public access to and understanding of the legal system.[42]
In 2021 "Lady Hale Gate", a passage leading from Chancery Lane into Gray's Inn was named in her honour. It is home to Gatehouse Chambers.
In 1968, Lady Hale married John Hoggett, a fellow law lecturer at Manchester, with whom she had one daughter, Julia Hoggett, who joined London Stock Exchange as CEO in April 2021. The marriage was dissolved in 1992. In the same year, she married Julian Farrand, former dean of the law faculty at Manchester,[8] and subsequently Pensions Ombudsman.
In April 2018, Lady Hale featured as a celebrity judge on BBC cooking show MasterChef.[63]
In September 2021, Lady Hale appeared on BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs.[64] In the following month she unveiled a blue plaque in honour of Helena Normanton on 22 Mecklenburgh Square in London, saying: "Helena Normanton was the pioneer of female barristers. She had to overcome a great deal of prejudice and discrimination. A blue plaque is a fitting tribute to her courage and her example to women barristers everywhere."[65]
Bibliography
Parents and Children (1977, 2nd ed. 1981, Sweet and Maxwell) ISBN9780421279100
Gules two scrolls in saltire Argent banded crosswise Vert attached thereto four seals in cross Or all between four towers crenellations outwards Argent.[67]
Supporters
Two frogs Vert crowned Or.
Motto
Omnia Feminae Aequissimae (translated by Debrett's in 2007 as "Everything To The Most Just Woman", but widely discussed in media in 2019 as "Women Are Equal To Everything"[68][69])
Symbolism
The castles represent Richmond while the scrolls represent the law. The crowned frog supporters represent the frog prince.[70] For Hale, the frog prince relates to her husband and her large collection of ceramic frogs. ("It's an inside joke between us. My husband was my frog prince. Now people give us frogs.")[71]
↑Berglof, Annie Maccoby (12 August 2011). "Taking tea in Wonderland". Financial Times. Archived from the original on 11 August 2018. Retrieved 11 August 2018.