Lord Bingham of Cornhill

The death on 11 September 2010 of Lord Bingham of Cornhill, former Senior Law Lord and one of the architects of the still new UK Supreme Court, has been noted elsewhere in Edinburgh Law School's blawgs, but Scots Law News would wish to add a word or two of appreciation of a great judge and a fine man.

Your correspondent met Lord Bingham only twice but will always remember the first time in particular.  It was a dinner in a plush Westminster venue in the late 1990s at which the gathering, having fed and wined, was to discuss the future of the European Union.  Lord Bingham said little; but your correspondent foolishly allowed himself to be provoked into angry speech by the anti-European tone of many of the rather too self-satisfied and Anglo-centric other contributors around the table. 

That rant having had no discernible effect on the mood of the meeting, a post-prandial and despondent stroll in the direction of the St James' underground was interrupted by the sound of running feet behind; and there was Lord Bingham, empathetic and conversational while  properly avoiding anything European or difficult about the experience we had just shared.  We did however share the Tube to somewhere in west London, where his Lordship left me to continue my progress to a hotel by Heathrow from which I was due to depart for Edinburgh in the early morning.  A human moment for which your correspondent remains grateful; and one that to judge from obituaries here, here, and here was typical of the man.