The Inn’s Master Reader Lord Hughes with the four new Academic Fellows. [Dr Christine Bicknell on the far right]

Exeter academic receives prestigious fellowship

A law academic from the University of Exeter has been awarded a prestigious Academic Fellowship that recognises outstanding contribution of legal teaching and research.

Dr Christine Bicknell, a public international lawyer and lecturer at the University of Exeter, is one of four leading legal academics to be selected to take up this prestigious three year role appointed by the Honourable Society of the Inner Temple.

Dr Bicknell specialises in the prevention and prohibition of torture at both European and UN levels, in which she has direct practical experience working.

Funded by the UK’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Dr Bicknell has worked previously in a research capacity directly supporting the UN’s Subcommittee for the Prevention of Torture (SPT) through a significant period of growth, and has also been seconded to its Secretariat in Geneva.

She has similarly also been involved in collaborative work with the UN’s National Human Rights Institutions Unit.

Some of Dr Bicknell’s significant contributions include research and drafting support contributing to an important publication by the UK’s All-Party Parliamentary Group on International Religious Freedom or Belief; and a large study on human rights treaty body monitoring, commissioned by the UK’s Equality and Human Rights Commission.

“I am delighted to have been appointed as an Academic Fellow of the Inner Temple” said Dr Bicknell.

“It is a very great honour, and am very much looking forward to working with the Inn and making the most of this wonderful opportunity.”

The Honourable Society of the Inner Temple is one of the four barrister Inns of Court of England and Wales.

Their Academic Fellowship Scheme aims to recognise the outstanding contribution of legal teaching and research of early to mid-career academics to the Bar of England and Wales. It also aims to support their research and to build stronger ties between barristers and legal academia.

Having the opportunity to bring together practitioners and academics, who The Inner Temple recognise for their outstanding contribution to teaching and research, is a key principle of the Inn. The Inner Temple’s Academic Fellows Scheme helps to foster debate and understanding between these two communities.

In addition to its fundamental training role, the Inner Temple works closely with universities across the UK to provide information on the profession to aspiring entrants. Last year, the Inner Temple reached nearly 3000 university students and hundreds of legal academics and tutors. This included its specific programme to support students from non-traditional backgrounds to enter the profession, the Pegasus Access and Support Scheme (PASS).

Date: 21 November 2018