First female judge to have served as President of the Supreme Court of England & Wales

Brenda Hale, Rt Hon the Baroness Hale of Richmond DBE, was born in Yorkshire and studied Law at Girton College, Cambridge. She was called to the Bar in 1969 and spent almost twenty years in academia whilst also practising as a barrister for a short time.

In 1984, Lady Hale became the first woman and the youngest person to be appointed to the Law Commission, where she oversaw critical reforms in family law and mental disability law. She also began sitting as a part time judge, was appointed a QC in 1989, and became a full time judge in the Family Division of the High Court of England and Wales in 1994.

She was the first and only woman to become a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary, joining the appellate committee of the House of Lords in 2004, when it was still the top court for the whole United Kingdom. She was the first woman to serve on the newly created Supreme Court, was appointed Deputy President in 2013, and its President from 2017 to 2020.

She lives in Richmond, North Yorkshire.

Akima Paul Lambert focuses on high-stakes commercial litigation and arbitration. She often works with clients on large, multijurisdictional disputes. She has experience in commercial and investment treaty arbitration, and is dual-qualified in the UK and in the U.S.

Akima has significant experience acting for financial institutions, corporations and professional firms in litigation and arbitration proceedings arising out of commercial, banking and financial disputes.

According to Benchmark Litigation Europe (2020), Akima is “professional, brilliant and dedicated to the task,” and “a very responsive and diligent lawyer” who is “very capable of handling complex matters and always delivers what she promises.” She has also been listed as an EMpower Ethnic Minority Future Leader Role Model 2020 which recognises worldwide future senior leaders who are making a significant contribution to ethnic minority inclusion at work.

Akima is significantly involved in pro bono and has worked on and co-ordinated a range of pro bono matters in relation to international economic development and human rights.

Akima spearheaded the creation of the firm’s Caribbean Desk, which advises clients on transactions, projects and disputes throughout the region. The Caribbean Desk is comprised of lawyers from across our network, including our London, Washington D.C., New York and Miami offices.

Associate, Hogan Lovells

Farheen Ahmed is an Associate in the Global Products Law practice focusing on product regulation and compliance, product-related commercial issues and consumer law.

Hogan Lovells

Aliya is an associate in the Financial Services practice, advising on the UK and EU financial services law and regulation. Her clients include financial institutions, private equity firms, investment managers, FinTechs and financial market infrastructures.

Aliya assists clients in navigating complex issues arising out of the changing regulatory landscape. Her work includes cross-border regulatory advice, multi-jurisdictional compliance reviews, advice on digital assets and blockchain projects, FCA applications, and advising on the EU Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (SFDR) and Taxonomy Regulation.

Head of the CEDR Foundation, a consultant, lead trainer and mediator for CEDR

The Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR) is a leading conflict resolution provider, specialising in mediation, negotiation and alternative dispute resolution processes. We work with tens of thousands of parties a year around the world to help them to resolve their conflicts through dispute resolution services; learn the skills to handle conflict more effectively through our training services; and design effective solutions for future conflicts through our consultancy. At the heart of CEDR’s work is the CEDR Foundation a unit which helps to innovate society in alternative dispute resolution and supporting the next generation to gain these skills. We are an independent non-profit organisation and a registered charity and our mission is “Better Conflicts. Better Outcomes. Better World”.

Director of Training and Consulting at CEDR, a senior consultant and mediator

The Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR) is a leading conflict resolution provider, specialising in mediation, negotiation and alternative dispute resolution processes. We work with tens of thousands of parties a year around the world to help them to resolve their conflicts through dispute resolution services; learn the skills to handle conflict more effectively through our training services; and design effective solutions for future conflicts through our consultancy. At the heart of CEDR’s work is the CEDR Foundation a unit which helps to innovate society in alternative dispute resolution and supporting the next generation to gain these skills. We are an independent non-profit organisation and a registered charity and our mission is “Better Conflicts. Better Outcomes. Better World”.

BBC’s first Gender & Identity Correspondent

Megha is the BBC's first global gender and identity correspondent. She covers issues concerning women's rights and LGBT communities, and race and ethnicity, for the BBC's 41 language services. She has travelled to and reported from six continents and secured exclusive interviews with Michelle Obama, Amal Clooney, Finland’s all-women coalition government and pop star Billie Eilish. Megha is a deployment journalist who files longform original features for BBC World TV, radio, online and social media. Megha has consulted on Level Up’s media guidelines on how to responsibly report domestic abuse. She has presented these guidelines at the International Journalism Festival and Reuters Institute of Journalism.

Barrister, Old Square Chambers, Specialising in Equality & Discrimination

Nadia is a senior barrister and tenant at Old Square Chambers in London where she has been in practice for 18 years. Nadia specialises in employment and discrimination, professional discipline and public law. She has represented and advised on hundreds of discrimination cases in varied contexts from employment to education and from the supply of goods and services to the exercise of public functions. Her expertise covers all protected characteristics but especially in race, sex and disability.

Prior to being called to the Bar, Nadia was a Harvard Human Rights Fellow at the European Roma Rights Center in Budapest, a Research Assistant at the Law Commission and a part time lecturer and teaching fellow at several leading UK and US universities including Kings College London and Harvard University.

Professor, International Law, School of Oriental & African Studies, University of London, Co-Founder of ATLAS

Dr Michelle Staggs Kelsall joined SOAS as a Lecturer in International Law in July 2018. Prior to joining SOAS, Michelle worked for several years as a Human Rights Officer for the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights as well as in leadership positions for not-for-profit centres undertaking applied research in Southeast Asia and West Africa (Sierra Leone). This included leading trial monitoring programmes and conducting training for judges and lawyers working at UN-assisted international criminal tribunals in Sierra Leone and Cambodia.

Michelle is the Co-Founder of ATLAS (Acting Together: Law, Advice, Support) - a women’s legal network with over 6,000 members on all five continents, whose vision is to secure equal representation of women lawyers at all stages of their careers in the field of international law and policy across the globe.

Campaigner, feminist activist, author & the founder of Stop Taxing Period

Laura Coryton MBE is a British campaigner, feminist activist and author. She is the founder of Stop Taxing Periods, a campaign to abolish the Tampon Tax in the United Kingdom and make menstrual products exempt from VAT, and runs the Relationships and Sex Education (RSE) social enterprise Sex Ed Matters. Coryton published her first book 'Speak Up!', a campaign guide for rebel girls, in 2019. She was awarded her MBE in the King's New Years Honours List of 2024.

Coryton was named one of The Observer's and Nesta's 2016 New Radicals. In December 2016, the BBC included her in their list of Five women who aren’t on Wikipedia but should be.

Director, Caring Family Foundation

Katie is the Director for the Caring Family Foundation, a charity dedicated to improving the lives of women and children. Her leadership of the foundation encompasses strategic and operational delivery, as well as financial oversight. Katie has over 15 years’ experience combatting Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking (MSHT), Domestic Abuse (DA and Child Sexual Abuse and Exploitation (CSAE).

Katie previously worked in the charity sector as Head of Domestic Abuse and Modern Slavery for a leading charity provider, with a dedicated team of over 250, supporting over 2,500 vulnerable adults and 600 vulnerable children. Previously a Crown servant, she was appointed to two prime ministerial taskforces and has a Master’s degree in Health and International Development from the London School of Economics and Civil Service Leadership training.

Deputy Secretary General at the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom

Lailaa is a human rights lawyer with 15 years of experience in litigation, advocacy and management, and a track record as a leader and strategist. Her areas of focus include peacebuilding, effective governance, and human rights of women. She is a qualified lawyer and trainer of International Humanitarian Law, and she holds an LLM in human rights and conflict.

She is currently the Deputy Secretary General at the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom she serves on the governance and advisory boards of several regional and international human rights organisations, trusts and foundations. She believes in the power of activism and mobilisation and she advocates for a feminist future, an anti-racist community and the protection of our planet.

Tasnima Uddin, Co-founder for Nijjor Manush

Barrister, 36 stone (The 36 Group)

Khadija specialises in commercial litigation and international arbitration across areas including banking and finance, international trade, commodities, energy, oil and gas. Recent experience includes working on complex derivatives trading and margin call disputes and a multi-million-dollar dispute relating to swap transactions affected by Russian sanctions.

Khadija also has a background in international human rights law and is able to advise on all aspects of business and human rights. She is involved in a number of initiatives seeking to advance equality, diversity and inclusion at the Bar.

International Pro Bono Partner and co-lead of the Social Impact Practice, Hogan Lovells. Yasmin Waljee OBE has been key to establishing and embedding a pro bono culture within Hogan Lovells.

The objective is to deliver an outstanding pro bono service to charities, individuals and social enterprises in need who would not otherwise be able to afford such advice. Yasmin helped the firm achieve this by designing and implementing pro bono projects which draw on the firm's commercial legal knowledge and skills to produce measurable outcomes nationally and internationally. Yasmin is an international human rights lawyer and has advised on issues relating to compensation for victims of crime and terrorism including the July 7 bombing victims, the right to life, and regularly works on public policy issues in this area. Yasmin co-leads the firm's award-winning social enterprise and social finance practice. She is the firm's International Pro Bono Partner.

Her appointment in 1997 as a legally qualified, full time pro bono manager was the first of its kind in Europe. She is part of the firm's Citizenship panel and manages the worldwide giving initiative and community investment programme with members of the corporate responsibility and citizenship team. Yasmin is the Vice-Chair of Mosaic, the HRH Prince of Wales led initiative to support young Muslims and their peers growing up in deprived areas whilst breaking down the barriers and suspicions with British Society.

She sits on the Advisory Panel to the UK's Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner and is a member of the British Council's Society Advisory Group. Yasmin received an award for the most inspirational woman of the year, Daily Mail, 2008, 50 most influential women in the law 2007; finalist Asian Woman of the Year 2005 and Woman Solicitor of the Year 2000, The Times. In 2010, Yasmin was awarded an OBE in the HM Queen's New Year Honours list.

CEO of Obelisk Support & Founder of the First 100 Years

Dana Denis-Smith is the CEO of Obelisk Support and the founder of the First 100 Years campaign. A TedX speaker, Dana is regularly invited to address industry events and comment in the media on gender equality, entrepreneurship and legal technology. In 2020, she was recognised for her work as a women's advocate and champion of gender equality with the Special Contribution Award at the Women in Law Awards. In 2019, she was awarded the Outstanding Achievement in Legal Services by The Legal 500 and, in 2018, she was voted Legal Personality of the Year at the LexisNexis Awards. Dana was shortlisted in the 2022 FT Innovative Lawyers Europe awards, and she was awarded her second honorary doctorate in laws from the University of Glasgow in recognition of her contribution, achievements, and positive impact on the legal profession in June 2022. In October 2022, Dana took her seat as an elected Council member of The Law Society to represent women solicitors and support DEI across the solicitors’ profession.

In 2010, she founded Obelisk Support to provide flexible legal solutions to FTSE100 and law firms by working with lawyers that needed to work remotely and more flexibly around their family or other caring commitments. Obelisk Support was highly commended at the 2022 Lawyer Awards for ‘Law Company of the Year’ and is again ranked in Chambers and Partners 2022 as a leading service provider – praised by clients for being "commercial and flexible". In 2020 Obelisk Support won Supplier of the Year at the Women in Law Awards. In September 2023 Obelisk Support became a certified B Corporation; one of only eleven legal businesses to achieve B Corp status.

In 2014, Dana founded the First 100 Years, a national charitable campaign to celebrate the first 100 years of women in the legal profession in the United Kingdom and Ireland. Under Dana’s leadership the campaign has created a lasting legacy for future generations of lawyers, involving institutions such as the British Library, Supreme Court and The Law Society. As of 2020, the campaign is now replaced by the Next 100 Years, focusing on the future of the legal profession for women.