Lady Arden, who will be here talking to law students next week (14 March - sign up here) spoke last year as part of the First 100 Years Project. She opened up about the adversity she faced during the early stages of her career, growing up in the north west of England in a male dominated professional environment.
In her earlier years, Lady Arden had dreamed of becoming a doctor; however realising she was not so great at maths, her desires moved onto pursuing a career in the legal profession. This made sense as her brother, father and grandfather were already solicitors. Rather than follow in their exact footsteps, Arden decided she’d like to become a barrister and this is where she faced criticism.
“There was lots of sucking of breath saying it’s going to be difficult you know, but it was all about well you can be a solicitor, but you can’t be a barrister. People will never instruct you and you will never be able to get on.”
Highlighting the importance of having role models to inspire ambition, Lady Arden was lucky enough to be able to look up to Liverpudlian barrister Rose Heilbron. Heilbron had become the first woman to lead in a murder case and one of the first women to be appointed to the King’s Counsel.
Carving out an equally successful legal career, Lady Arden went on to specialise in company law at London’s Erskine Chambers, talking silk in 1986. She served as Attorney General of the Duchy of Lancaster between 1991 and 1993, and later the Court of Appeal from 2000 to 2018.
Continuing her quest for breaking the mould in her legal career, Lady Arden questioned the need for judges to be named as Mr and Mrs Justice and calling for the title to removed. This call faced criticism and was not changed, but later appeals to allow female judges to be sworn in as Lady rather than a blanket title of Lord for all, were accepted.
Lady Arden was pleased to encounter many female judges in her international work, with countries such as Australia, Canada, New Zealand and Germany having a ratio of 40% women in their top courts. This did however highlight the gender imbalance in the UK Supreme Court. Helping to address the imbalance, Lady Arden was appointed to the UK Supreme Court bench in October 2018 to join Lady Black of Derwent and Baroness Hale of Richmond.
She hopes the next generation of women will find it easier to balance life, work and family.
Watch her full interview with the 100 Years Project here: