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    What Makes a Good Judge?

    Everyone agrees that good judges are essential for the maintenance of the Rule of Law. But what makes a judge a good judge and how should we recruit them?

    female statue sitting holding scales and sword of justice

    The Future of Life on Earth

    Although life is probably widespread in the universe, our pale blue dot, Earth, is the only known place harbouring intelligent life. Even if we manage to stave off extinction by climate change, avoid a nuclear apocalypse and the dangers of runaway AI, biological life on our planet will eventually come to an end in about 5 billion years’ time. What are the astrophysical dangers to life on Earth, and the prospects for life’s survival into the distant future?

    Alien creature emerging from craft

    Segregation and the Rule of Law

    The law has been used to entrench and uphold racial prejudice, most infamously in South Africa during the apartheid years, but also in the United States in the period up to the mid-twentieth century. In South Africa and the southern states of America, judges showed themselves willing to use the law to uphold and promote white supremacy. This lecture will discuss the uneasy interplay between the concept of the rule of law and the enforcement of segregation legislation

    Civil rights march on Washington

    Human Rights in the UK and the Commonwealth Caribbean

    The Human Rights Act 1998, which incorporated the European Convention on Human Rights into domestic law, was a landmark moment in British legal history, with quasi-constitutional protection for fundamental rights. Meanwhile, the national constitutions of the Commonwealth Caribbean contain fundamental rights provisions which are often inspired by, but diverge significantly from, the European Convention. This lecture will examine the judicial protection of human rights in the UK and the Commonwealth Caribbean, and will confront its shortcomings and vulnerabilities.

    Collage crowd, bill of human rights, King John signing the Magna Carter and slaves cutting sugar cane

    The Brixton Riots: Policing the Black Community in the Last 40 Years

    Since the 1981 Brixton riots, many things have changed in British policing. However, Black people are still nine times more likely to be stopped and searched than white people, and three times more likely to be arrested; Black people are far more likely to be searched, arrested and prosecuted for using drugs, and yet are no more likely to use drugs than white people. This lecture explores the persistence of police racism and what we can do about it.

    Collage black male, Leslie Scarman, London streets and policemen

    The Broken Cosmic Distance Ladder

    Measuring distances to astronomical objects outside our Galaxy is a surprisingly hard challenge: it wasn't until 1929 that Edwin Hubble obtained proof that Andromeda is indeed a galaxy in its own right. Today, astronomers extend distance measurements in the cosmos to the edge of the visible Universe, building up a 'cosmic distance ladder' made of several rungs. This talk will explore a major conundrum of contemporary astronomy: as observations have become more precise, the distance ladder appears today to be broken.

    ladder silhouetted against starry sky

    Children and Consent to Medical Treatment

    How does the law consider children in cases involving medical consent? This lecture will look at how doctors (and parents) should talk their children about illness. It will also consider what should happen when parents and doctors disagree about what a child should be told. The overall law on consent has changed markedly in England and Wales since Montgomery (2015), and requires doctors to share and explain risks, but it is not clear how far this applies to children, particularly older children.

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