“Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?” Genesis 18.25

In 1268, the first Chief Justice of the King's Bench was appointed, known as the Lord Chief Justice from the 17th century. It is a post of antiquity and grandeur, now held by someone so important that she decided to change the title.

The Rt. Hon. the Baroness Carr of Walton-on-the-Hill is so grand that the ancient nomenclature was not good enough for her, she decided to be the Lady Chief Justice. As soon as she was appointed, she also made a statement on diversity, stating her commitment to fostering an inclusive environment.

Both these decisions, to change the title to the more politically correct one, and to bang on about the fashionable, modish, even Islingtonian issue of diversity and inclusion, shows her to be a political as well as a judicial creature.

Unlike normal politicians, she does not need to be elected, but it turns out she does not like to be criticised either. Judges who stray into politics cannot expect to be treated with the same reverence as those who stay resolutely above the political fray.

Lady Carr, this week, gave a press conference in which she managed to claim that judges do not court publicity. As she herself was preening in front of some pretty favourably disposed journalists, the only tough question came from Charles Hymas at the Daily Telegraph; this seems specious at best. She also said that judges only speak through their judgments, as she was pontificating on a range of issues to the media.

Judges are meant to be clever, so she must have known that it was absurd to claim to eschew the limelight whilst she was busy ‘schewing’ it, and cannot have failed to realise how political she was being.

In her prepared remarks, before taking questions, the Lord Chief Justice went well beyond her role as an impartial figure. She called for change and more funding and, using New Labour's formulation, moaned about “decades of underinvestment”. What she actually means is more cash from taxpayers to spend on more fat cat lawyers.