Anthony Rivers Woodbridge - 2000
Anthony Woodbridge is a Solicitor, who has not only practised law but has established and managed law practices, whilst at the same time being much involved in the administration of charities and of National Health Service Trusts.
Anthony Woodbridge was born in Belfast and was Educated at Stowe, at L'Institute de Touraine in France, at Trinity Hall Cambridge where he read law, and he qualified as a Solicitor in 1967.
He then became a Partner in the firm of Woodbridge & Sons of Uxbridge, a family firm of Solicitors founded in 1796. He has remained with this firm in its various incarnations under which it has changed both its form and its name, ending up today as The WOODBRIDGE Partnership, which specialises in personal injury litigation, family law, and computerised debt collection.
He has since 1988 been Clerk to the General Commissioners of Income Tax for the Uxbridge Division, which is responsible for tax matters in this area. The Clerk is the legal advisor to the Commissioners, acts as Clerk at appeal hearings, and is responsible for the appeal system in the area.
Anthony Woodbridge has also been much involved with charitable work, particularly with the Abbeyfield Uxbridge Society from 1974 to 1998, where he ended up as Vice Chairman of the charity which provides supportive care for lonely elderly persons in specially converted houses in Uxbridge and Hayes. The charity would like to extend its care provision to provide for people with a higher level of dependence. In addition in 1994 he became Chairman of the Harrow and Hillingdon Healthcare NHS Trust, which provides community nursing services for Harrow and Hillingdon in conjunction with other NHS providers and which also manages the West London NHS Direct service. The trust continues to be pro-active in its discussions with GPs and others in the move towards a primary care led National Heath Service. It also led the West London Pilot for the introduction of the National Heath Service telephone nursing service, NHS Direct. It is also worth remarking that Anthony Woodbridge is one of the longest standing Chairmen appointed to any National Health Trust; he surmises that the length of tenure of a trust chairman may be inversely proportional to the amount of trouble that he causes to the governing authorities, i.e. the more trouble you cause, the shorter your reign!
Last but not least, his work with charities also includes acting as Honorary Solicitor to Age Concern and as Legal Advisor to the Samaritans.
Anthony Woodbridge has for many years been a loyal supporter of Brunel University and of Brunel University students. He has been a member of Court and was instrumental in the setting up of the Turberville-Woodbridge Prize for law students, which was awarded annually. The Woodbridge Partnership also runs a weekly legal service for Brunel students seeking legal advice. The surgeries for this are held in the student union and involve advice on matters such as housing and accommodation, consumer rights and accident matters. It is expected that human rights matters will also become more prominent with the introduction of the new legislation this autumn. Finally it should be noted that all this advice is given to students free of charge.
DUniv - July 2000
