Michael Fordham

Sir Michael John Fordham (born 21 December 1964), styled The Hon. Mr Justice Fordham, is a judge of the High Court of England and Wales assigned to the King's Bench Division. He was appointed as a Justice of the High Court on 13 January 2020. He went on to study law at Hertford College, Oxford having been awarded a place through the Tanner Scheme. After achieving a First class degree, he stayed on at Oxford until 1987 to undertake a Bachelor of Civil Law (BCL).

During his career as a barrister spanning 1990 to 2020, he specialised (inter alia) in public law, administrative law, immigration and asylum, health and human rights, arguing more than 50 cases in the House of Lords and the Supreme Court.

Fordham is a Bencher of Gray's Inn where he formerly served as Master of Students.

Cases argued The following are among the cases argued by Fordham during his career as a barrister:

R (Miller) v The Prime Minister and Cherry v Advocate General for Scotland Lauzika, R (On the Application of) v Secretary of State for the Home Department EWHC 1045 (Admin) Secretary of State for the Home Department v ZAT and Ors EWCA Civ 810 Pinochet, In re UKHL 1; 1 AC 119; 1 All ER 577; 2 WLR 272 Keyu & Others v Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs & Anr EWCA Civ 312 R (March) v Secretary of State for Health EWHC 765 (Admin) R v Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, ex p Al-Fayed

Author As a legal practitioner specialising in judicial review, Fordham has authored seven editions of his Judicial Review Handbook. In the foreword to the 5th Edition, Lord Woolf paid tribute to the author, saying that the handbook was "an institution for those who practise public law".