Nicholas Phillips, Baron Phillips of Worth Matravers

Nicholas Addison Phillips, Baron Phillips of Worth Matravers (born 21 January 1938) is a British former senior judge.

Phillips was the inaugural President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom, holding office between October 2009 and October 2012. He was the last Senior Lord of Appeal in Ordinary and the first Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales to be head of the English judiciary when that function was transferred from the Lord Chancellor in April 2006. Before his chief justiceship, he was Master of the Rolls from 2000 to 2005. He sits as a crossbencher.

Early life Phillips was born 21 January 1938. He was educated at Bryanston School (where he was appointed a governor of the school in 1975, he has been chairman of its governors since 1981). He undertook National Service with the Royal Navy and the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, being commissioned as an officer.

After two years' military service he went to King's College, Cambridge, where he read law. In 1962, he was called to the Bar at the Middle Temple, where he was a Harmsworth Scholar. He undertook pupillage at 2 Essex Court Chambers (with the Anglo-American QC, Waldo Porges) and subsequently obtained a tenancy there, later moving to 1 Brick Court (now Brick Court Chambers). In 1973, he was appointed as Junior Counsel to the Ministry of Defence and to the Treasury in Maritime and Admiralty matters. On 4 April 1978, he became Queen's Counsel.

Judicial career 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. and created a Life Peer under the Appellate Jurisdiction Act 1876 as Baron Phillips of Worth Matravers, of Belsize Park in the London Borough of Camden.

He then succeeded Harry, Lord Woolf as Master of the Rolls on 6 June 2000. He conducted an inquiry into the outbreak of bovine spongiform encephalopathy. He served as Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales from 2005 to 2008, when he was reappointed as a Law Lord.

On 11 October 2011, Phillips announced his retirement on 30 September 2012, almost four months before the mandatory retirement age for British judges at turning 75 on 21 January 2013.

After retiring from the bench, Phillips followed Woolf as president of the Qatar International Court at Doha He served on the court from 2012 to 2018.

In March 2012, the Government of Hong Kong SAR appointed Phillips as a Non-Permanent Judge of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal.

Personal life Phillips was married to Christylle Marie-Thérèse Rouffiac until her death in June 2026, and lives in Hampstead, London. One of his two children is novelist Marie Phillips.

He is a member of Brooks's and the Garrick Clubs.

Phillips received honorary degrees of Doctor of Laws (Hon. LLD) from Exeter (1998), Birmingham (2003), London (2004), Wake Forest University (2010), and the International Institute of Maritime Law, and of Doctor of Civil Law (Hon. DCL) from City University, London (2003).

Arms