Dame Laura Cox served as a Justice of the High Court from November 2002 to November 2016. Previously, from 1995 to 2002, she was the Head of Chambers at Cloisters where she specialised, wrote and lectured for many years in equality and employment law and in personal injury and clinical negligence.

She was appointed as Queen’s Counsel in 1994 and appeared in many of the leading cases in both domestic and European Courts. Whilst at the Bar she chaired the Bar Council Sex Discrimination Committee and, subsequently, the Equality Policy Committee overseeing the implementation and development of the Equality Code for the Bar.

In 1998 Laura Cox was appointed as the British member of the International Labour Organisation Committee of Experts, a post she held for 15 years, monitoring ILO Member States’ compliance with international labour and equality standards, with particular emphasis on the 1951 Equal Remuneration Convention.

She was a member of Council for the organisation “Justice” and, in December 2002, she received a lifetime achievement award from ‘Liberty’ and ‘Justice’ for her commitment to equality and human rights over 25 years at the Bar.

She is a Bencher of Inner Temple and an Honorary Fellow of Queen Mary, University of London.

From 2003 to January 2011 she served as Chair of the Equal Treatment Advisory Committee, advising the Judicial Studies Board (now the Judicial College) on equality and diversity training for the judiciary. She was subsequently the Course Chair for the judicial cross-jurisdictional skills seminars for courts and tribunals judges at all levels.

She was the Vice President of the United Kingdom Association of Women Judges from 2013-2016 and is currently the Honorary President of the Association of Women Barristers.