Master Carr – Lady Chief Justice, Mr Birch, Benchers, members and guests.
102 years after this Inn called Ivy Williams to the Bar, we gather in our Hall to mark and salute the appointment of Master Carr as the first Lady Chief Justice of England and Wales.
I was tempted to say, “Just 102 years after…”, but tonight is not the occasion for expressions of irony or social commentary – at least not from this white male Treasurer of the Inn. Rather, it is an evening to combine congratulation – warm and heartfelt – on the personal achievement of our new Chief, with celebration – joyous and historic – of the striking significance of her appointment as leader of our judiciary.
Master Carr, your Inn of course wishes to bathe in a suitable measure of reflected glory. As we recall Ivy Williams; as we remember all those ‘female firsts’ who are celebrated in portraits, photographs and impressions about this building; as we look across to the conversation piece at the far end of this Hall, with its embodiment of high achievement and judicial excellence; as we delight in the recent appointments to the Supreme Court and the International Criminal Court; and as we look to the range of our activities in education and training and outreach across the country – this Inn is, with due modesty and a proper sense of the advances which still have to be made, entitled to take pride in that reflection.
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Master Carr, throughout your career at the Bar and on the Bench, you have been at the heart of the Inn’s work and mission – not least in your service as Chair of the Education and Training Committee and as a member of the Executive Committee. Your Inn takes delight at your appointment and your achievement. You surely know that this Inn will always be here as your home and as a place of warm support.
Not least since the reforms of 2005, the position of Lady (or Lord) Chief Justice imposes the most enormous demands on its occupant: constitutionally; administratively; as a judge in many of the most important criminal and civil cases; and as a figure in the public eye.
All who have had the privilege and good fortune to observe and work with you over the years, know how well suited you are to these various roles and to all the daily pressures which they bring. To the necessary professional skills which you possess in such abundance are added your quite astonishing energy; your humanity; and your caring eye for all those with whom you work, at every level.
In meeting all these tasks, I know that you would be the first to acknowledge and avow the matchless support which you receive from your husband, Alex. Through all the pressures of his hugely demanding work and career, he, we know, has been your rock and your stay. It is a very particular pleasure for the Inn to welcome him here this evening.
With all the sure confidence that we have in your great fitness for the work to come, we know that fortune will inevitably play its part. So, in saluting you tonight, we all in your Inn offer our affectionate and warmest best wishes for every success and happiness – yes, and good luck – throughout your term of office.
May we stand. The toast is “Master Carr, Lady Chief Justice”.
—
The Hon Mr Justice Michael Soole
Treasurer
Reply by the Lady Chief Justice, The Rt Hon The Baroness Sue Carr of Walton-on-the-Hill
Thank you, Master Treasurer, Master Reader, my Ladies, Lords and Gentlemen.
Keep it short said Master Andrew Popplewell. And I will, although I am not sure – in the light of this sumptuous dinner – that Master Popplewell was thinking of the words of Sir Matthew Hale: in the administration of justice, one should be “short and sparing at meals” that we could be “fitter for business”. We were reminded of those words in the beautiful Evensong service in the Temple Church just now.
But I must express my thanks for your generosity towards Alex and me this evening – and of course for more than that.
Reflecting on my early years as a student and young barrister, the Inn was more than just a backdrop; it was a central character in my narrative. And how appropriate. James I granted a charter to use the land at Inner Temple on the condition that the lands be used for the education and accommodation of students.
I remember the happy weekends acting and singing in Cumberland Lodge – with Master Reader at the piano. I remember acting in what was then the Littleton Theatre and pretending to hold really important meetings as President of The Inner Temple Students Association. I remember standing almost on this very spot and doing an appallingly bad piece of debating. I remember three glorious months working in Sydney as a Pegasus Scholar under Lord Goff’s careful stewardship.
More than anything else I remember the extraordinary kindness of the Benchers. One person sadly missing from this evening is Master Jonathan Hirst, who nominated me to be a Governing Bencher. Just as I wonder about what Tony Weir would be saying, I wonder what Jonathan would have made of all this.
I have to say a few words about Education and Training, a subject of passion for me. I loved my time on, and latterly as chair of, the Education and Training Committee. During that time, we weathered the stormy waters of getting Project Pegasus off the ground. It was always crystal clear to me that we had no option but to press ahead and that we would get through it. After all, when I arrived in the Inn, it was a building site. Gerard Noel, in his book, Portrait of Inner Temple, paints a picture of the Inn during its late 1980’s redevelopment. He notes “on some occasions, an unsuspecting visitor would mistake this bastion of legal learning for a chaotic building site, obscured by polythene sheets, and a maze of scaffolding tubes and planks.”
This chaos, however, was a sign of progress, a testament to our enduring commitment to growth and excellence.
It was this pursuit of advance – and modernity – that was always the allure of The Inner Temple for me.
So, it is no coincidence that I am following in a long line of female firsts by Inner Temple women, to whom I would like also to pay tribute this evening. To identify but a few:
So here is to all the amazing women of The Inner Temple.
And here, again, is to your support. Speaking of props, I have become alarmingly fond of Mrs Malaprop as I tour the jurisdictions of England and Wales. In Sheridan’s 18th century comedy, The Rivals she is in hot pursuit of Sir Lucius O’Trigger – she believes herself to be intelligent, but her verbal blunders prove otherwise. So, she speaks of the “geometry” of contagious countries; she hopes that her daughter might “reprehend” the true meaning of what she is saying, regretting that her “affluence” over her niece is very small. My favourite: he is the very “pineapple of politeness”.
Do you remember Mike Tyson’s “I might just fade into Bolivian”? Do you remember Mistress Quickly saying that Falstaff was “indited to dinner”…and the TV character Archie Bunker saying, “What do I look like, an inferior decorator?”
So, I think that there may be similarities between Mrs Malaprop and me – for I do love a malaprop. May I remind you of some of my best so far: the woman who spoke of her husband’s “erotic driving”, of her mother’s “double inconvenience” and her own desire to build a “conservative” onto the back of her house. Or to the mediators in the house: “you tried to negotiate but the parties remained intransitive”.
Anyway, from a student in 1986 to the front cover of the most recent newsletter as the first Lady Chief Justice has been a real journey. It is one through which I have been buoyed at every step of the way by the Inn. Thank you, and I will continue to try to do you proud.
Many have said what a splendid evening this is – my sediments exactly.
The Rt Hon The Baroness Sue Carr of Walton-on-the-Hill
Lady Chief Justice of England and Wales
