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Dame Heather Steel was educated at Howell’s School in Denbigh and at the Faculty of Law (as it then was) in the University of Liverpool, where she graduated with an LL.B. in 1962. Steel engaged with Student Guild activities whilst she was an undergraduate student at Liverpool, including appearing in a production of ‘Pantopera’.
Steel was called to the bar by Gray’s Inn in 1963. Steel practiced on the Northern Circuit joining Chambers at 14 Cook Street, Liverpool. These were her father’s chambers. Steel was Prosecuting Counsel to the Department for Health and Social Security (DHSS) from 1984 to 1986.
In terms of her judicial career, Steel was appointed a Recorder in 1984 and then a circuit judge in 1986. Steel sat in the courts at Preston. This circuit judge position is the same rank that her sister, Her Honour Judge Elizabeth Steel, reached during her own judicial career.
Dame Heather Steel was appointed to the High Court of England and Wales in 1993. She received the customary Damehood in that year and was also made a Bencher of Gray’s Inn.
As a High Court judge, Steel sat as a judge of the Queen’s Bench Division. She also sat in the Old Bailey, London. Steel retired early in 2001 at the age of sixty-one, but continued to hear cases in a part-time capacity.
Steel also sat as a judge on the Court of Appeal of Guernsey. This was a post she held from 2004 to 2012. She has also conducted an inquiry in Guernsey and was a member of several committees, including the criminal law committee of the Judicial Studies Board (1992-1995), President of the Merseyside Medico-Legal Society (1992-1994), Law Faculty Association, University of Liverpool (1994-), and the Advisory Council, Society for Advanced Legal Studies (2001-).
Steel also had close connections to the City of London. She was appointed to the Guild of Freeman of the City of London in 1996. She was a Freeman of the City of London from 1993 and was made a Liveryman of the Patternmakers Company in 1993, becoming Master in the 2003 for a year. Steel was also appointed a member of the Fan Makers’ Company in 2005.
Steel married David Kerr-Muir Beattie in 1967. Together they have a son and a daughter. Christie notes that one is a surgeon and the other is an oil engineer.[ii] According to Who’s Who, her recreations include theatre, gardening, art and antiques.
References
[i] On who see further: Christie, S. The Steel Sisters, in: Fagan, N & Bryson, G & Elston, C (Eds). A Century of Liverpool Lawyers. Liverpool Law Society, Liverpool. 2002, pp.183-184. Hereafter Christie. See also: Who’s Who, (2020, December 01). Steel, Dame (Anne) Heather, (Dame Heather Beattie), (born 3 July 1940), a Judge of the High Court of Justice, Queen’s Bench Division.
[ii] Christie, p.183.
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