Lord Kerr was in attendance alongside a host of other luminaries on Tuesday evening as St Mary’s University launched its new law school.

Lord Kerr, who serves as a Justice on the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom, helped mark the official unveiling of the revamped St Mary’s Law School by delivering a keynote speech at the Twickenham-based university's campus.

The speech, which focused on the ongoing relationship between European and British law as well as the challenges facing current students of law, was the highlight of an evening that also saw the university release details of a series innovative new undergraduate and masters programmes.

Pro-Vice Chancellor of St. Mary’s University, Ruth Kelly heralded an ‘incredibly exciting few months’ for St Mary’s University after the launch of its new law school.

Kelly, who is the Twickenham-based university’s Pro Vice-Chancellor, was speaking at the official unveiling of the revamped St Mary’s Law School and a series of new and innovative undergraduate and postgraduate programmes.

The evening also served to highlight the progress St Mary’s has made since being awarded a full university title in 2014, with the new law school following swiftly on from the launch of the Business and Society faculty last month.

"It's been an incredibly exciting few months. Just recently St Mary's launched the School of Business and Society and now we're launching St Mary's Law School,” Kelly said.

"St Mary's Law is developing very rapidly. We launched our first law courses six years ago and then a couple of years ago we introduced the LLB in Law and Criminology. Now tonight we're launching two masters programmes - both LLMs - and one with the ICP.

As part of the new courses, St Mary’s students will have the opportunity to spend a semester abroad as the Institut Catholique de Paris (ICP); an aspect Kelly believes will give them an edge when it comes to future employability.

"Our students are going to have fantastic opportunities,” she added. “The students studying the new Masters programme in International and European Business Law will spend one semester here at St Mary's in our London campus and then another semester in the heart of Paris at the ICP campus.

“They'll be able to learn about English law and also French and European law as well as being able to learn the technical expertise and much more fully develop their knowledge of the world around them, different cultures and a global orientation.

"We're determined to produce graduates who can make a difference to the world around them and that means not just having technical expertise but also a clear set of ethical values. The way law is taught at St Mary's and also at the ICP is to put a real emphasis on learning those ethical behaviours and values. I think that will set us aside from other law courses.”