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Vera Baird
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Vera Baird
Dame Vera Baird DBE KC (née Thomas; born 13 February 1950)[failed verification] is a British barrister and politician who has held roles as a government minister, police and crime commissioner, and Victims' Commissioner for England and Wales.
A Labour Party Member of Parliament for Redcar from 2001 to 2010, Baird was a government minister from 2006 to 2010 and the Solicitor General for England and Wales from 2007 to 2010. She served as the Police and Crime Commissioner for Northumbria Police from November 2012 to June 2019. She was appointed as Victims' Commissioner in June 2019 and resigned in September 2022, accusing government ministers of downgrading victims' interests.
Baird was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in the 2017 New Year Honours for services to women and equality.
Baird was born in Oldham, Lancashire, and attended Yew Tree County Primary School and the local authority-run Chadderton Grammar School for Girls. She gained an LLB from Newcastle Polytechnic. While at Newcastle Polytechnic she founded and edited a student newspaper, Polygon. The next year, she was elected vice president of the Polytechnic Union. In 1983 she gained a BA in literature and modern history at the Open University.
Also in 1983 she became a legal associate of the Royal Town Planning Institute. She completed the first year of an MA in modern history at London Guildhall University from 1999 before transferring to the University of Teesside on being selected for Redcar. She is currently studying for an MPhil (History) at the University of Teesside.
She is an honorary fellow of St Hilda's College, Oxford, and of Teesside University, and an honorary professor of London South Bank University. In November 2017 Baird was appointed an Honorary Fellow of Durham University Law School.
Baird was called to the Bar at Gray's Inn in 1975 and first practised in the North East, setting up Collingwood Chambers in Newcastle upon Tyne, with other young barristers, shortly after she finished her pupilage and becoming its Head of Chambers for some years.
In 1983 she was retained to act for Billingham Against Nuclear Dumping (BAND) when the then nuclear waste disposal agency NIREX planned to store intermediate-level nuclear waste in a disused anhydrite mine under Billingham, though the plans were abandoned in 1985 when the owners of the mine, ICI, refused to co-operate. At the conclusion of the campaign her fees were, at her direction, donated by BAND to the Druridge Bay Campaign. She subsequently represented similar groups opposed to nuclear-waste dumping threatened at Fulbeck in Lincolnshire (Lincolnshire Against Nuclear Dumping- LAND), at North Killingholme on Humberside (HAND) and at Bradwell (BAND) in a lengthy High Court action in 1986 before the plans were abandoned by the Conservative government shortly before the 1987 general election.[citation needed]
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Vera Baird
Dame Vera Baird DBE KC (née Thomas; born 13 February 1950)[failed verification] is a British barrister and politician who has held roles as a government minister, police and crime commissioner, and Victims' Commissioner for England and Wales.
A Labour Party Member of Parliament for Redcar from 2001 to 2010, Baird was a government minister from 2006 to 2010 and the Solicitor General for England and Wales from 2007 to 2010. She served as the Police and Crime Commissioner for Northumbria Police from November 2012 to June 2019. She was appointed as Victims' Commissioner in June 2019 and resigned in September 2022, accusing government ministers of downgrading victims' interests.
Baird was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in the 2017 New Year Honours for services to women and equality.
Baird was born in Oldham, Lancashire, and attended Yew Tree County Primary School and the local authority-run Chadderton Grammar School for Girls. She gained an LLB from Newcastle Polytechnic. While at Newcastle Polytechnic she founded and edited a student newspaper, Polygon. The next year, she was elected vice president of the Polytechnic Union. In 1983 she gained a BA in literature and modern history at the Open University.
Also in 1983 she became a legal associate of the Royal Town Planning Institute. She completed the first year of an MA in modern history at London Guildhall University from 1999 before transferring to the University of Teesside on being selected for Redcar. She is currently studying for an MPhil (History) at the University of Teesside.
She is an honorary fellow of St Hilda's College, Oxford, and of Teesside University, and an honorary professor of London South Bank University. In November 2017 Baird was appointed an Honorary Fellow of Durham University Law School.
Baird was called to the Bar at Gray's Inn in 1975 and first practised in the North East, setting up Collingwood Chambers in Newcastle upon Tyne, with other young barristers, shortly after she finished her pupilage and becoming its Head of Chambers for some years.
In 1983 she was retained to act for Billingham Against Nuclear Dumping (BAND) when the then nuclear waste disposal agency NIREX planned to store intermediate-level nuclear waste in a disused anhydrite mine under Billingham, though the plans were abandoned in 1985 when the owners of the mine, ICI, refused to co-operate. At the conclusion of the campaign her fees were, at her direction, donated by BAND to the Druridge Bay Campaign. She subsequently represented similar groups opposed to nuclear-waste dumping threatened at Fulbeck in Lincolnshire (Lincolnshire Against Nuclear Dumping- LAND), at North Killingholme on Humberside (HAND) and at Bradwell (BAND) in a lengthy High Court action in 1986 before the plans were abandoned by the Conservative government shortly before the 1987 general election.[citation needed]
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