Wednesday 27 February 2013 by Catherine Baksi
Three solicitors and the chairman of the Bar Standards Board are among the eight honorary QCs appointed today in recognition of their contribution to the law outside courtrooms.
Eileen Carroll, founder and deputy chief executive of the Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR); equal pay champion Stefan Cross and Edward Walker-Arnott, former senior partner at City firm Herbert Smith Freehills, are the three solicitors to receive the suffix QC honoris causa.
Carroll, admitted as a solicitor in 1981, helped to establish mediation in the civil justice system during the past 22 years and was one of the UK's first commercial mediators. As a partner in an international law firm she was the key founder of CEDR and worked to create the non-profit campaigning body and international leader in dispute resolution.
As well as contributing to the leadership role at CEDR, she works as a senior mediation practitioner where she is regularly called upon by large UK and overseas organisations, including the US Department of State, the BBC and global banks, to resolve disputes through mediation.
Cross was admitted in 1985. He has worked widely in the area of equal pay law helping both men and women on a no-win no-fee basis. He has brought about changes for several hundred thousand women, resulting in more than £1bn being awarded to low-paid females.
Walker-Arnott was admitted in 1963. He has held a long career as a commercial lawyer and was senior partner at Herbert Smith Freehills where he remains a consultant.
He has been involved in a number of high-profile cases, including the creation, initial listing and subsequent development of Eurotunnel and advising Maxwell Communications following the death of Robert Maxwell.
Between 1977 and1982 Walker-Arnott sat on the Cork Inquiry into insolvency law, which led to the enactment of the Insolvency Act 1986. He also sat on the advisory group assisting Sir David Clementi in his review of the regulation of the legal profession.
BSB chair Lady Deech was recognised for her 40-year academic legal career. Former principal of St. Anne's College Oxford, Deech has published widely on issues ranging from genetics, IVF and the regulation of infertility treatment to family and property law.
She was chair of the UK Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority and dealt with the legalisation of stem cell research.
An active member of the House of Lords, she is a member of the select committee on communications and has been chair of the BSB since 2009.
The other four appointees are barristers and legal academics professors Ian Fletcher, Mark Freedland, Geraldine Van Bueren and Christopher Ormerod.
Fletcher is emeritus professor in the Faculty of Law at University College London. He has had a long career in comparative insolvency law and international co-operation in insolvency law and was elected an international fellow of the American College of Bankruptcy in 2008.
Freedland is a senior research fellow at the Oxford Law Faculty and its Institute of European and Comparative Law. He is a former professor of employment law at the University of Oxford and a law tutor at St John's College, Oxford.
Van Bueren is a professor of international human rights law at Queen Mary, London, and a barrister at Doughty Street Chambers. She is one of the original drafters of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and has served as lead commissioner for human rights on the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
Ormerod is a professor at Queen Mary College, University of London and a Law Commissioner.
The Ministry of Justice invited nominations for consideration as honorary QC between 1 June and 31 July 2012 and a selection panel made its recommendations to the lord chancellor, Chris Grayling, in December for passing on to the Queen.
