Sir Stephen Charles Laws, is a British lawyer and civil servant who served as the First Parliamentary Counsel between 2006 and 2012. Laws read law at Bristol, graduating in 1972. He was the first in his family to go to University. After a year lecturing at Bristol, Laws was

called to the Bar The call to the bar is a legal term of art in most common law jurisdictions where persons must be qualified to be allowed to argue in court on behalf of another party and are then said to have been "called to the bar" or to have received "call to ...

Middle Temple The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, commonly known simply as Middle Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court exclusively entitled to call their members to the English Bar as barristers, the others being the Inner Temple, Gray's Inn an ...

, and following

pupillage A pupillage, in England and Wales, Northern Ireland, Kenya, Malaysia, Pakistan and Hong Kong, is the final, vocational stage of training for those wishing to become practising barristers. Pupillage is similar to an apprenticeship, during which bar ...

and a brief period practising, he joined the Home Office in 1975 as a legal assistant. He transferred to the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel the next year, and excepting two secondments to the

Law Commission A law commission, law reform commission, or law revision commission is an independent body set up by a government to conduct law reform; that is, to consider the state of laws in a jurisdiction and make recommendations or proposals for legal chang ...

, stayed there until his retirement, rising first to Deputy Parliamentary Counsel in 1985, and then Parliamentary Counsel in 1991. He replaced Sir Geoffrey Bowman as First Parliamentary Counsel in 2006. As head of the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel, Laws was responsible for the drafting of all the government legislation which is laid before

Parliament In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...

. Alongside the

Treasury Solicitor The Government Legal Department (previously called the Treasury Solicitor's Department) is the largest in-house legal organisation in the United Kingdom's Government Legal Service. The department is headed by the Treasury Solicitor. This office go ...

and the

Director of Public Prosecutions The Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) is the office or official charged with the prosecution of criminal offences in several criminal jurisdictions around the world. The title is used mainly in jurisdictions that are or have been members o ...

, Laws was one of the three most senior lawyers in the

Civil Service The civil service is a collective term for a sector of government composed mainly of career civil servants hired on professional merit rather than appointed or elected, whose institutional tenure typically survives transitions of political leaders ...

. He undertook his

LLB Bachelor of Laws ( la, Legum Baccalaureus; LL.B.) is an undergraduate law degree in the United Kingdom and most common law jurisdictions. Bachelor of Laws is also the name of the law degree awarded by universities in the People's Republic of Chi ...

Bristol University , mottoeng = earningpromotes one's innate power (from Horace, ''Ode 4.4'') , established = 1595 – Merchant Venturers School1876 – University College, Bristol1909 – received royal charter , type ...

, graduating in 1972, and was thus the first non-

Oxbridge Oxbridge is a portmanteau of Oxford and Cambridge, the two oldest, wealthiest, and most famous universities in the United Kingdom. The term is used to refer to them collectively, in contrast to other British universities, and more broadly to de ...

graduate to hold the office. Laws was appointed a CB in the 1996 New Year Honours. He was promoted to KCB in 2011. On retiring as First Parliamentary Counsel in 2012, Laws was asked in an interview for ''Civil Service World'' whether he had been a victim of

nominative determinism Nominative determinism is the hypothesis that people tend to gravitate towards areas of work that fit their names. The term was first used in the magazine ''New Scientist'' in 1994, after the magazine's humorous "Feedback" column noted several ...

. He replied that his choice of career was more influenced by his father's interest in the law, but conceded that “hereditary nominative determinism” may have been at work. Laws is currently a senior research fellow at

Policy Exchange Policy Exchange is a British conservatism in the United Kingdom, conservative think tank based in London. In 2007 it was described in ''The Daily Telegraph'' as "the largest, but also the most influential think tank on the right". ''The Washing ...

's Judicial Power Project.

References

Year of birth missing (living people) Living people First Parliamentary Counsel Members of the Middle Temple Alumni of the University of Bristol Knights Commander of the Order of the Bath Honorary King's Counsel {{UK-gov-bio-stub

See also

References