About

Deaf, Rob is a non-practising solicitor and since qualification, has advised over 2,000 members of the deaf community on a range of legal issues, mostly employment and discrimination.

He is currently a Senior Lecturer in Law at UWE Bristol teaching employment law and professional legal skills at undergraduate and postgraduate level.

Rob was awarded his doctorate in 2020 by the University of Leicester examining the title: ‘Making equality law work for Deaf people.’ More information about his thesis can be found here.

Rob has an interest in equality and anti-discrimination law as it relates to deaf people, language law and sign language recognition and is currently focused on developing Deaf Legal Theory as a new perspective in legal jurisprudence.

Rob is involved in deaf education research, having published two reports with Rachel O’Neill at the University of Edinburgh looking at the impact of the BSL (Scotland) Act 2015 and comparing Welsh- and Gaelic-medium education with that of BSL, putting forward recommendations on how to ensure BSL is taught as part of the new Curriculum for Wales.  They are currently looking at ethical dilemmas for Teachers of Deaf Children and Young People and in the process of publishing their research findings.