Professor Lucy Vickers

MA, PhD, SFHEA

Director of Research

School of Law and Social Sciences

Lucy Vickers

Role

Professor Lucy Vickers studied law at Queens' College, Cambridge, and qualified as a solicitor before joining the Law Department at Oxford Brookes University. Her main research area is the protection of human rights within the workplace. In particular she focuses on religious discrimination at work and age equality. In addition she works on freedom of speech at work, including protection for whistleblowing, and the right to freedom of speech under the European Convention on Human Rights. She was President of the Society of Legal Scholars for 2022-2023.

Teaching and supervision

Courses

Modules taught

  • Criminal Law
  • Equality Law
  • Inequality, Diversity and Human Rights

Supervision

Lucy welcomes PhD applications in the area of equality law, with particular interests in religious equality, age equality and the Public Sector Equality Duty. She is also interested in supervising in the area of law and religion. 

Research Students

Name Thesis title Completed
Richard Fretwell Religious Freedom in a Post-Christian Age: A critical analysis of liberalism, secularism and human rights through the lens of religious freedom in education in England Active
Stephen Hurley The protection of non-religious philosophical belief in the British workplace Active
Craig Allen How should improper religious impulsion be regulated by the law of England and Wales? 2021
Dr Sarah Hayes The extent to which public engagement by the religious precinct destabilises religious autonomy 2019

Research

Lucy Vickers’ main research area is the protection of human rights within the workplace and aspects of equality law. She has written extensively on issues relating to harassment at work, religious discrimination and age discrimination. She is the author of Freedom Of Speech and Employment (2002) OUP, and Religious Freedom, Religious Discrimination and the Workplace (2016, 2nd edition) Hart Publishing, a report for the European Commission on Religion and Belief Discrimination in Employment – The EU Law (2007), and a review for the EHRC of equality and human rights law relating to religion or belief (Report 57, EHRC, 2015, written with Professor Edge).

Centres and institutes

Publications

slide 1 of 6

Professional information

Conferences

  • Conscientious Objections in Employment – Is Reasonable Accommodation the Answer?’ At Exempting Conscientious Beliefs in the UK conference at Cambridge University, June 13 2017
  • Responding to Religious Diversity: Religious Freedom or Religious Equality’ At Berkeley Comparative Equality and Anti-Discrimination Law Study Group Annual Conference 2017, Trinity College Dublin, 16th June 2017
  • ‘Freedom of Religion or Belief and Employment Law’ at "The European Court of Human Rights and the Freedom of Thought, Conscience and Religion: The 25-Year Legacy of Kokkinakis,” May 27-28, 2017 at Central European University in Budapest, Hungary.
  • Respondent on ‘Reasonable Accommodation and the workplace’ at Religious Pluralism and Secularism in Europe, Max Planck Institute Luxembourg  16th January 2015. 
  • Meeting the challenges of active ageing in the workplace: is the abolition of retirement the answer?  Chuo University, Tokyo, Japan March 2014
  • ‘Religious Freedom: Expressing Religion, Attire and Public Spaces’ at Religious Freedom and Equal Treatment: An International Look, Brooklyn Law School, sponsored by American Civil Liberties Union, the International network of Civil liberties and the Information Society Project at Yale Law School. (October 2013)
  • ‘Equality and Human Rights: New Grounds for Concern’ Keynote presentation at Symposium ‘Equality and Human Rights: Nothing but Trouble?’ Utrecht University, 18th November 2013
  • ‘Recent Case Law from the ECtHR on Religious Discrimination’ at ERA Seminar, Trier, Germany, 11-12 November 2013 on Current Reflections on EU Anti-Discrimination Law
  • ‘Retirement and age equality: Dignity and Solidarity Perspectives’ at Labour Law Research Network Inaugural Conference, Barcelona 13-15 June, 2013
  • ‘Religious belief and the employment rights of NHS Staff’ at The David Price Memorial Seminar Series “The Influence of Faith and Belief on the Formulation, Content and Operation of Health Law in the United Kingdom” Leicester De Montfort Law School, De Montfort University Leicester Friday, April 12th 2013
  • ‘Religion and Belief, EU Law and Equalities: New Legal Developments’ at Fair  Treatment for All: Religion and Belief, Law and Equalities Seminar,  European Network on Religion and Belief March 19 – 20 2013  Brussels , Belgium
  • “Religion and Teaching Staff” at UCL seminar Negotiating Religion: Inquiries Into the History and the Present of Religious Accommodation, 12 June 2012, UCL London.
  • “The ECHR Protection of Religious Freedom and the EU Directive” at The ECHR and the employment relation The prospects after Demir and Baykara and the Lisbon Treaty
  • Seminar organised by the Université Catholique de Louvain in co-operation with the Transnational Trade Union Rights Working group (ETUC), Friday 25 November 2011 Fondation Universitaire de Belgique
  • ‘Religious Disputes: the case of employment,  at ‘Transformation of Church and State Relations in Great Britain and Germany’, Munster University, 01 and 02 July 2010