Dinah Rose


Dinah Gwen Lison Rose QC is a British human rights barrister. A member of Blackstone Chambers, she was named Barrister of the Year in The Lawyer Awards 2009. In 2016, she was appointed a Deputy Judge of the High Court. In February 2020. she was elected President of Magdalen College, Oxford, in succession to Sir David Clary: she will take up the post in September 2020, and will be the first woman to hold the position.

Early life and education

Rose was born on 16 July 1965, and was educated at City of London School for Girls. She studied modern history at Magdalen College, Oxford, and law at City University.

Legal career

She was called to the bar at Gray's Inn in 1989, and took silk in 2006. In a July 2009 interview with The Lawyer, she referred to Lord Lester, QC as a "mentor" and described Lord Pannick QC as a "huge influence".

Notable cases

She has appeared in many high-profile human rights cases, including representing "extraordinary rendition" victim Binyam Mohamed at his Court of Appeal hearing.
Rose also worked on the judicial review of the Attorney General's decision to drop the investigation into alleged bribes of Saudi officials by BAE Systems.
Rose represented the family of a child who had been denied a place at the prominent Jewish comprehensive school, JFS, because his mother was not recognised as Jewish by the Office of the Chief Rabbi. The Supreme Court of the United Kingdom ruled that the denial of a place constituted unlawful race discrimination.
She appeared for Julian Assange in Assange v The Swedish Judicial Authority before the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom, in his unsuccessful appeal against extradition to Sweden.
It was announced in October 2012 that Rose had been appointed by the BBC to investigate its culture and policies in relation to sexual harassment and bullying, following the Jimmy Savile sexual abuse scandal. Respect at Work, for which 930 employees were interviewed, was published at the beginning of May 2013. Rose and her team found 37 cases of alleged sexual harassment by 35 persons between April 2006 and November 2012, but said cases of bullying were much more common, and were often not properly investigated by BBC management. Rose said in June that a "very troubling" atmosphere existed between staff and their superiors at the BBC.

Politics

In March 2013, Rose ended her party membership of the Liberal Democrats in protest at Nick Clegg's support for the coalition government's justice and security bill describing it as a "betrayal of the party's guiding principles".