Baron Joffe
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The Lord Joffe CBE |
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| Born |
Joel Goodman Joffe 12 May 1932 Johannesburg, Transvaal Province, South Africa |
| Died | 18 June 2017 (aged 85) Liddington, Wiltshire, England, U.K. |
| Alma mater | University of Witwatersrand |
| Occupation | Human rights lawyer |
| Children | 3 |
Joel Goodman Joffe, Baron Joffe, CBE (12 May 1932 – 18 June 2017) was a South African-born British lawyer and Labour peer in the House of Lords.
Born in Johannesburg, South Africa, to a mother born in Palestine and a father born in Lithuania. Joffe grew up in a Jewish household before being sent to Catholic boarding school. He was educated at the University of Witwatersrand (BCom, LLB 1955), and worked as a human rights lawyer 1958–65, including as defence attorney of the leadership of the ANC at the 1963-4 Rivonia Trial, helping to represent Nelson Mandela. Later he moved to the United Kingdom in 1965, and worked in the financial services industry, setting up Hambro Life Assurance with Sir Mark Weinberg as well as in the voluntary sector.
Joel chaired The Swindon and Marlborough Health Authority and The Ridgeway Hospital and was a member of The Royal Commission on the Care of the Elderly. He was associated with Oxfam in various roles between 1982 and 2001, including being its Chair 1995–2001. He was a trustee of many different charities and actively pursued a range of charitable activities through the Joffe Charitable Trust.
He was awarded Honorary Doctorates from the Open University (1995), De Montford University (2000), Witswatersrand University (2001), Brunel University (2004) and Bath University (2006). In 2016, he was awarded the Freedom of the City of London.
He was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 1999 New Year Honours, and made a life peer on 16 February 2000, being raised to the peerage as Baron Joffe, of Liddington in the County of Wiltshire. In February 2003 he proposed as a Private Member's Bill the "Assisted Dying for the Terminally Ill Bill", which would legalise physician-assisted dying. After deliberation by a Lords committee, the bill was put forward again in November 2005.
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