The new Chancellor of the diocese, Professor Mark Hill QC (pictured left with Bishop Nick) has been formally sworn in at a ceremony held on April 16th at a meeting of Bishop’s Council in Leeds.
As Chancellor, Professor Hill acts as an independent judge of the Consistory Court on matters where there is a dispute – for example church buildings and faculties, as well as granting common marriage licences.
Since the Diocese of West Yorkshire and the Dales came into being at Easter 2014, the acting Chancellor has been Judge John Bullimore who will continue serving the diocese as Deputy Chancellor.
Professor Hill said, “I am delighted to have been appointed Chancellor of England’s youngest diocese at this exciting time. I look forward to streamlining the work of the Consistory Court and to harvesting the best of the practice of each of the three merged dioceses.”
He added, “I am grateful to Judge John Bullimore for acting as caretaker Chancellor for the past year, to Peter Foskett for his energetic presence in the new Diocesan Registry and to Bishop Nick Baines for the vision and leadership he brings to the people and parishes of West Yorkshire and the Dales.”
Professor Hill is an experienced canon lawyer and has been Chancellor of the Diocese of Chichester since 1999 and of Gibraltar in Europe since 2004. He is also Deputy Chancellor of the Dioceses of Blackburn and York. Mark is a Visiting Professor at Cardiff and Pretoria Universities and at King’s College, London, and is Ecumenical Fellow in Canon Law at the Venerable English College in Rome. He sits as a Recorder on the Midland Circuit and as a Deputy Judge in the Upper Tribunal. He is consultant editor of the Ecclesiastical Law Journal, and a former President of the European Consortium for Church and State Research. His publications include Religion and Law in the United Kingdom (2nd edn, 2014), Religion and Discrimination Law in the European Union (2012), Ecclesiastical Law (3rd edn, 2007), Religious Liberty and Human Rights (2002) and English Canon Law (1998). He is co-editor of Magna Carta, Religion and the Rule of Law which will be published next month.