5:00pm-7:00pm on Wednesday 18 March
Times shown are in GMT (UTC +0) up to the 26th March. For events on or after 27th March times are in BST (UTC +1).
Faculty of Law, The David Williams Building, LG19, Sidgwick Site, 10 West Road, CB3 9DZ
The 2026 Baron de Lancey Lecture - Professor Sir Ian Kennedy KC(hon), FBA, LLD
The Centre for Law, Medicine and Life Sciences is delighted to announce that the 2026 Baron de Lancey Lecture will take place at 17:00 on Wednesday 18 March 2026. The event will take place in person at the University of Cambridge’s Law Faculty, but with the option of joining online for a live broadcast.
Event overview: Each year, the Baron de Lancey Lecture brings a leading mind to Cambridge to dissect a contentious and cutting-edge topic in medical law and ethics. This year, Professor Sir Ian Kennedy will speak on “Autonomy in Healthcare”, revisiting arguments first advanced in his 1980 Reith Lectures on the power imbalance between clinicians and patients and the need to place patient autonomy at the centre of medical decision-making.
Professor Sir Ian Kennedy will reflect on how respect for autonomy has taken hold in law and practice over the past four decades while remaining a fragile commitment. Drawing on developments over the past four decades, he will examine how autonomy continues to challenge decision-makers across contexts including assisted dying and cosmetic surgery.
About the Speaker: Professor Sir Ian Kennedy KC (Hon), FBA, LLD is one of the UK’s foremost authorities on health law, ethics and policy. A pioneering figure in the development of medical law and ethics, he founded the Centre of Medical Law and Ethics at King’s College London in 1976, which became a model for the field. His scholarship and public engagement has helped to shape modern understandings of patients’ rights, medical accountability and health governance. Beyond academia, Sir Ian has chaired major public inquiries and commissions, including the Bristol Royal Infirmary Public Inquiry (1998–2001), the Nuffield Council on Bioethics (1998–2002) and the Healthcare Commission (2002–2009). His contributions have been recognised with a knighthood (2002) and election as a Fellow of the British Academy.
Join us for a compelling discussion on the balance of power, ethics, and choice in modern medicine.
The Baron de Lancey Lecture series is kindly supported by the Ver Heyden de Lancey Fund.
