Paul Maguire

Who is Paul Maguire?

Sir Paul Richard Maguire is a High Court Judge in Northern Ireland. Prior to that he was a barrister and a politician.

Maguire was called to the Bar in 1978 and became Queen’s Counsel in 2006.He lectured at Queen’s University, Belfast, and served as a part-time Chairman of the Employment Tribunals.

Maguire unsuccessfully stood for election to Belfast City Council for the Alliance Party of Northern Ireland in 1981. He was then elected at the Northern Ireland Assembly election, 1982 for North Belfast.

He stood for the Alliance party in the equivalent Westminster constituency of North Belfast at the 1983 general election, taking 9.1% of the vote, then again at the Belfast North by-election, 1986, when he increased his vote share to 16.7%.

In the mid-1980s, Maguire left politics and focused on his legal career, rising to become Queen's Counsel by the 2000s, and representing the Government in a number of high-profile cases.

In 2010, he was appointed to head an inquiry into Peter Robinson's knowledge of his wife's improper financial affairs. He was a member of the human rights advisory committee of the Bar Council. In 2012, he was named a judge of the High Court of Northern Ireland.