OBE for senior jurat of Royal Court

ONE of the most familiar faces in the Royal Court has been awarded an OBE. Jurat David Lowe was elected to the bench in November 1993.

The award comes in recognition of his services to the Guernsey Royal Court.

He said that the office of jurat was a great honour for anyone and a position that was still greatly respected by the people of Guernsey.

'I see this honour as recognition of the work undertaken by all jurats,' he said.

'The job is a fascinating one and you meet people from all walks of life and in all sorts of circumstances.'

Jurat Lowe has served under three Bailiffs ' Sir Graham Dorey, Sir de Vic Carey and Geoffrey Rowland.

He was first approached about the position in 1988 when he was managing director of Bucktrout's.

Jersey's Ann Street Brewery had just taken over the company and he was bound to stay with it until December 1993.

'I couldn't consider entertaining it in 1988 because of my contractual obligation,' he said.

His eventual appointment as jurat followed another approach, from former conseillers Bob Chilcott and Roydon Falla.

In 1995 he was appointed acting-Magistrate and Lt-Bailiff in 1998.

He became senior jurat in 2000.

'A jurat's job doesn't stop when they come out of court and it lets you into other things within the community,' he said.

An example of this was the highly successful Guernsey Gosh appeal, which raised '550,000 in 20 months to fit out a Guernsey floor in the patients' hotel opposite Great Ormond Street Children's Hospital.

Jurat Lowe accepted an offer from former Lt-Governor Sir John Foley to be chairman of Gosh and the appeal was wound up in September to coincide with the completion of Sir John's tenure.

That money could not have been raised without support from many people, according to Jurat Lowe.

Born in Guernsey in 1936, Jurat Lowe said he was proud to have been educated at the Boys' Intermediate School. Upon leaving school in 1952 he joined accountants Black, Geoghan and Till before moving to Bucktrout's, where he became managing director in 1980.

He is married to June, nee Bayait, and the couple have two children, Richard, 42, and Jennifer, 40, and a grandson, Jamie, 5.

Jurat Lowe has an extensive business background.

He was a director of the International Energy Group until the company was sold earlier this year and is a former chairman and director of Barclays Finance and a former director of Lazards.

He is currently a director of Prism Insurance Management and Islands Insurance.

A hobby led to him setting up the Guernsey Butterfly Farm in 1976 and he is a Fellow of the Royal Entomological Society.

The farm put on tropical butterfly exhibitions in all major European countries.