Helena Kennedy, Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws

Early life and education

Kennedy was born on 12 May 1950 in Glasgow, Scotland, one of the four daughters of Mary Veronica (née Jones) and Joshua Patrick. Her parents were committed Labour activists and devoutly Catholic. Her father, a printer with the Daily Record, was a trade union official.
She attended Holyrood Secondary School in Glasgow, where she was appointed Head Girl. She studied law at the Council of Legal Education in London

Legal career

In 1972, Kennedy was called to the bar at Gray's Inn. Among her many cases, Kennedy acted as junior counsel for child murderer Myra Hindley during her 1974 trial for plotting to escape from Holloway Prison.

Politics

Kennedy rebels against her party whip in the House of Lords more frequently than any other Labour Peer, having a dissent rate of 33.3%. She was Chair of Charter 88 (1992–1997) and is closely affiliated to the educational charity Common Purpose.

Academia

Kennedy was elected principal of Mansfield College, Oxford in July 2010 and served from September 2011. She retired in 2018 and became Chancellor of Sheffield Hallam University on 26 July 2018.

Personal life

From 1978 to 1984 she lived with the actor Iain Mitchell, and together they had a son. In 1986, Kennedy married Dr Iain Louis Hutchison, a surgeon, with whom she has a daughter and a son.
Kennedy regularly attends Mass and professes that her Catholicism "remains very much part of who I am", even though she eschews its more traditional values.