As the first woman to serve as president of the UK Supreme Court, Baroness Hale has become a significant figure. She has been called the “Beyonce of the legal world”, with her eclectic choice of brooches making her an unsuspecting fashion icon. But when she became the first woman judge in the House of Lords in 2004, her arrival was not met with quite such excitement.
Lady Brenda Hale, who is now Baroness Hale of Richmond, told Hay Festival audiences that she had discovered what her male colleague Lord Hope thought of her appointment upon reading his published diaries.
