(518)  NEW LORD PRESIDENT ANNOUNCED

 

It was announced on 24 November 2005 that The Queen had been pleased to approve the appointment of The Right Honourable Lord Hamilton as Lord President of the Court of Session in Scotland in succession to The Right Honourable The Lord Cullen of Whitekirk.

 

Arthur Campbell Hamilton (63) was born in Glasgow and attended Glasgow High School.  He studied at Glasgow, Oxford (BA) and Edinburgh (LLB) Universities, completing his studies in 1967.  He was admitted to the Faculty of Advocates in 1968 and became QC in 1982.  He was an Advocate Depute (1982-85), Chairman of the Medical Appeals Tribunals (1988-92) and President of the Pensions Appeal Tribunal (Scotland) (1992-95).  Over several months in 1992 and 1993, during the indisposition of the Sheriff Principal of Tayside, Central and Fife, he acted as a temporary Sheriff Principal in that sheriffdom.  From 1988 to 1995 he was a Judge of Appeal of the Courts of Appeal of Jersey and Guernsey. 

 

In 1995 he was appointed as a Senator of the College of Justice.  Between 1997 and 2000 he was a full-time commercial judge dedicated to commercial business and responsible for oversight of that aspect of Court of Session business.  In January 2002 he was appointed as a judge of the Inner House where he sat principally on appellate business.

 

See previously No 516 (it is now understood that the essay there referred to was on the challenges facing the Scottish legal system over the next 10 years); and also No 249, for an earlier appearance of Lord Hamilton in Scots Law News as a defender of World Heritage sites in Edinburgh against the ravages of giant wheelie bins.