The Right Honourable Nicholas Addison Phillips, Baron Phillips of Worth Matravers, PC (born 21 January 1938) is a British judge who was Master of the Rolls from 2000 to 2005 and has been Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales since 1 October 2005.

Phillips was educated at Bryanston School; he enjoyed his time at the school and in 1975 he became a Governor of it; he has been Chairman of the Governors since 1981. He undertook his National Service with the Royal Navy and the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve where he was a commissioned officer; after the two years' service he went up to King's College, Cambridge where he read Law. In 1962 he was called to the Bar (Middle Temple) where he was the Harmsworth Scholar. He went into practice as a barrister, specialising in maritime law matters; in 1973 he was appointed as Junior Counsel to the Ministry of Defence and to the Treasury in maritime and Admiralty matters; in 1978 he 'took silk' and became a Queen's Counsel.

In 1982, Phillips was appointed a Recorder and from 1987 was a full-time High Court Judge on the Queen's Bench Division, with the customary knighthood. He took an interest in legal training, and was Chairman of the Council of Legal Education from 1992 to 1997. He presided over several complex fraud trials including those covering the Robert Maxwell pension fund fraud and Barlow Clowes. In 1995, he became a Lord Justice of Appeal and was appointed to the Privy Council. He was elevated to the House of Lords as Baron Phillips of Worth Matravers, of Belsize Park in the London Borough of Camden, in 1998. In early 1999 he was made a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary and in 2000 succeeded Lord Woolf as Master of the Rolls. He conducted an inquiry into the outbreak of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE).

He lives in Hampstead, London.

Styles

• Nicholas Phillips, Esq. (—1978)
• Nicholas Phillips, Esq., QC (1978–1987)
• The Hon. Mr Justice Phillips (1987–1995)
• The Rt Hon. Lord Justice Phillips (1995–1999)
• The Rt Hon. The Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers, PC (1999—)

External links

• Dyer, Clare, He pointed a finger where it ought to be pointed. He didn't go over the top ... He has shown himself to be politic, The Guardian, 23 September 2005.
• BSE enquiry, UK government.

1938 births | English judges | Life peers | Living people | Lords Chief Justice of England and Wales | Old Bryanstonians | Alumni of King's College, Cambridge