Law School welcomes 200 Legal Wales Delegates

On Friday October 7th, Bangor Law School hosts the Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, to headline the Annual Legal Wales Conference 2016, along with over 200 members of the senior Judiciary of England & Wales. Leading Constitutional Law Experts as well as the leading lights of the Legal Profession and Professors from around the United Kingdom, will gather to participate in a range of Plenary and Breakout specialist sessions on the theme of “Convergence or Divergence between English Law and Welsh Law”.

Spanning across a range of disciplines, there will be expert panels on topics as diverse the Impact of the Future Generations Act on Welsh citizens and public action; panels on the use of Technology in Courts in Wales; and developments in Administrative Justice in the various Ombudsmen and Tribunals dotted around the legal landscape will be considered.

This year’s Annual Michael Farmer Lecture shall be delivered by Lord Justice Davis of the Court of Appeal, and Mr Justice Moor will chair a panel of experts to consider the Social Services Well-Being (Wales) Act to consider how the Welsh approach is differing the from the English approach in areas such as childcare law and policy.

The Wales Bill, currently making its way thought the Houses of Parliament, will be treated to serious scrutiny, with BREXIT making its passage through the House of Commons all the more deserving of close examination by a panel led by Professor Rick Rawlings of UCL.  The Law Commissioner for England and Wales, Prof Nick Hopkins will lead a panel on the divergence between English Law & Welsh Law in the context of the Renting Homes (Wales) Act, and the President of the Law Society Robert Bourns will chair a panel on Challenges and Opportunities for Welsh Law in Practice. There will also be sessions on Planning Law divergences and Family Law, and a novel session on the Welsh Transplant Act and whether the public and the Government have the same understand of what the Welsh human organ transplant scheme conveys.

This year’s conference shall be the largest ever gathering of the Legal Wales Conference. This year’s Conference Director, Professor Dermot Cahill, Head of Bangor Law School, welcomed the tremendous interest in the programme from all quarters, and said that “it is now clear that there is major divergence taking place between how England and Welsh legislatures are approaching common issues that affect the citizen, and it is heartening to see how much interest there is on both sides of the border, amongst academics, practitioners, the judiciary  and public officials, all keen to gain a deeper understanding of the likely directions of future travel across a range of key areas”.  “And of course”, he adds, “BREXIT adds a nice bit of spice to events which will make the conference’s deliberations this year all the more interesting”. Keeping the best wine until last, the Conference will close with an Address by the Lord Chief Justice who is making a return visit to Bangor, having opened its Moot Court in 2014.  

Publication date: 6 October 2016