Ellie Reeves sworn in as new Attorney General

On 1 October 2026, Ellie Reeves was sworn in as Attorney General at the Royal Courts of Justice. On paper, that sounds like ceremony. Read closely, though, her first speech in post was really an explainer on who the law is meant to serve. GOV.UK says Reeves was appointed on 20 July 2026 after serving as Solicitor General, and the speech was published the next day, on 2 October. (gov.uk) For us as readers, that matters because the speech was not only about one politician taking office. It was about whether courts, government lawyers and the legal profession feel close enough to ordinary life for you to trust them.

If the title feels remote, it helps to slow down. According to GOV.UK, the Attorney General is the Government’s chief legal adviser, oversees the Attorney General’s Office and superintended departments including the Crown Prosecution Service, the Serious Fraud Office and the Government Legal Department, and has independent public-interest powers such as referring some unduly lenient sentences to the Court of Appeal. (gov.uk) **What this means:** the job is not simply ceremonial and it is not the same as being a judge. It sits in the uncomfortable but important space where law, prosecutions and political decision-making meet. (gov.uk)

In her speech, Reeves went out of her way to praise judges for upholding the rule of law with independence and integrity, and she said she would work to protect that independence. She was sworn in alongside Andy Slaughter as Solicitor General, while Alex Norris was also sworn in as Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice after appointments made in July 2026. (gov.uk) If that sounds constitutional and far away, bring it closer. When judges can do their work without political pressure, you are more likely to get a fair hearing based on law and evidence rather than whoever shouts loudest. That is one reason public trust in courts matters so much.

The most memorable section of the speech was personal. Reeves said she grew up in south-east London, went to a local comprehensive and did not know any lawyers. At 17, she doubted whether becoming a barrister was something people from her school did at all; her father pushed back with a line she still remembers: "if you don't do it, how will things ever change?" She then studied law at Oxford, was called to the Bar in 2004 and built her career in employment rights. (gov.uk) That part of the speech lands because many readers will recognise the feeling before they recognise the profession: the sense that certain jobs belong to other families, other accents, other postcodes. Reeves was clearly using her own story to say that law should not keep sending that message.

Before Parliament, Reeves represented trade unions and their members for more than a decade and later set up her own consultancy to support women facing maternity and sex discrimination at work. In the speech, she said that work taught her the law does not sit apart from life. (gov.uk) **What this means:** when you hear debates about employment law, discrimination or justice, you are also hearing debates about pay packets, job security, safety and dignity. That is why this speech works best when you read it not as courtroom ritual, but as a reminder that law reaches into the everyday.

Reeves also tied the role to one of the sharpest justice questions in the country: how the state treats victims of violence against women and girls. Government policy papers say the current cross-government strategy aims to halve violence against women and girls within a decade, and Reeves said tackling this was her top priority as Solicitor General. In July 2026, the Attorney General’s Office and the CPS announced the national rollout of the Early Victims’ Right to Review scheme for eligible rape and serious sexual abuse cases across England and Wales. (gov.uk) Then, on 27 September 2026, Reeves announced the national rollout of the Victim Transformation Programme. The Attorney General’s Office said every domestic abuse victim will get a dedicated victim liaison officer, and all victims will be able to choose whether the CPS contacts them by phone, email or post. (gov.uk)

One line in the speech may look dry, but it could shape how government behaves. Reeves said she had changed the Legal Risk Guidance a few weeks earlier. GOV.UK shows the updated guidance was published on 8 September 2026 and applies across government. It says legal advice should give ministers a clear assessment of risk, look for lawful ways to reduce that risk, and treat a policy as unlawful only where no tenable legal argument exists. (gov.uk) In plain English, the change is meant to make government lawyers more practical without dropping the basic rule that ministers must stay inside the law. Reeves presented it as a way to help ministers take decisions that are legally sound and can survive scrutiny. (gov.uk)

Reeves ended with a message to aspiring lawyers: do not let barriers tell you the profession is not for you, and work to break those barriers down. That is a hopeful note, but it is also a testable promise. If access to law is going to widen, it will need more than encouragement from a podium; it will need institutions that stop confusing privilege with potential. (gov.uk) For The Common Room, that is the real value of this speech. It gives you a way into a job title that can seem forbidding, and it turns a swearing-in ceremony into a lesson about power, fairness and who gets to belong inside the justice system.