The UK Supreme Court has a new justice. Lord Justice Snowden will join the court in June, bringing with him expertise in company law, corporate insolvency and, given his 30 years as a referee, one imagines the laws of rugby union. Reaction to the announcement has been understated, garnering little interest beyond the legal press. And, at least on one view, this is a good thing.
It is much better that our Supreme Court appointments eschew the politicisation that accompanies those of their US counterparts. In fact, we need to go back to Lady Simler’s appointment in October 2023 to find any sustained mainstream media coverage of an appointment among our most senior judges. The lesson here is that, while there is nothing new or surprising about another male justice, the appointment of a woman to the Supreme Court remains newsworthy. Understandably so – of the (then) 34 appointments to the UK Supreme Court, just five were women.
Progress toward a judiciary that is truly diverse – particularly at its senior levels – remains intolerably slow. The oft-repeated refrain that we have ‘the best judiciary in the world’ sits at odds with the uncomfortable truth, noted by Lady Hale in 2013, that, in relation to the gender of our judges, the judiciary in England and Wales is out of step with the rest of the world. Ten years later, gender representation in the judiciary is in exactly the same place: 42nd of 46 countries in the Council of Europe, followed only by Scotland, Armenia and Azerbaijan. Of course, gender is not the only measure here. In 2022, the Law Society estimated that it would take another 126 years for the proportion of the judiciary who are black to reflect that of the general population. And, in 2025, the Sutton Trust reported that 62% of the senior judiciary attended an independent school, compared with just 6% of the population.
At the same time, conversations about diversity appear to be going in circles. For decades, we have been told that there is ‘no quick fix’, but that ‘change is coming’, or that while there is ‘no room for complacency’, the judiciary has ‘changed beyond all recognition’ and progress is ‘better than people might think’. Without doubt, the judiciary is, in many respects, more diverse than it was, say, 10 years ago, let alone 20 or 30 years ago. An enormous amount of judicial energy continues to be expended to ensure the success of diversity and inclusion outreach activities. Moreover, this is happening at a time when many of those in a position to effect change are being buffeted by other concerns and priorities.
As Lady Hale noted in an interview published in the Guardian: ‘It was once taken as given, “often among people who had no direct knowledge of the justice system”, that it was “a site of national pride, the best in the world”. It’s still the case that “the people working in it really care about the system – the lawyers, the staff, the clerks, the prosecutors, the police, the judges. There are a lot of very dedicated people out there.” But the bottom line is, there isn’t enough money, particularly in criminal and family courts, and if it weren’t for those dedicated staff, “the whole thing would fall apart”.’
Little wonder that, in December 2025, 49% of those asked by YouGov either had ‘no’ or ‘not very much’ confidence in the courts and judicial system in Britain – an increase of 10 percentage points since 2019. Who our judges are will only be a small part of this. But, while nobody would suggest the judiciary ought in all respects to mirror the public it serves, one which is so unrepresentative will have a harder time earning, indeed justifying, that confidence.
Judicial diversity is not a panacea for an underfunded, understaffed and increasingly overwhelmed institution. But we should see it as part of the response. It needs to be part of the conversation. If we are really committed to having the ‘best’ judges and the world’s ‘best’ judiciary, we need to keep talking not only about how we might get a more diverse judiciary, but why we want one in the first place. We need to stop seeing judicial diversity as an end in itself, a free-standing issue or initiative, but rather as essential to the effective running and delivery of the justice system, as well as to wider political equality projects that seek to secure and protect fairness and justice across our institutions, culture and society. If we placed diversity at the heart of efforts to secure judicial strength, unity and quality, not only would we have better conversations about judicial diversity, but we might also, finally, move closer to making judicial diversity a reality.
Erika Rackley is a professor of law at the University of Birmingham and author of A Short History of Judicial Diversity. She also co-hosts the legal history podcast Not for Want of Trying
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