Philip Armitage

Philip is a Senior Legal Policy Advisor at JUSTICE, with a focus on public law and human rights, including the UK's membership of the European Convention on Human Rights and the Human Rights Act. He also leads JUSTICE's work on outsourcing, through our 2024 report Beyond the Blame Game: A responsible and rights-centred approach to government procurement, and improving benefits decision-making.

Philip prepared JUSTICE's briefings on the Bill of Rights Bill, the Illegal Migration Act and the Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Act. In 2025, he helped support a successful amendment to the Mental Health Act, which extended the human rights protections for those in outsourced mental healthcare. 

Philip graduated with a degree in Politics and Philosophy from the University of Sheffield, before completing the GDL. He was called to the Bar in 2015 before deciding to pursue a career as a Solicitor. He worked as a criminal defence paralegal, with a focus on Crown Court work, before moving to the Public Law team at Duncan Lewis Solicitors in 2017, where he qualified in 2020.

During his time at Duncan Lewis Solicitors, he worked on several high-profile public law challenges to immigration and detention policy, including successful litigation in the Court of Appeal challenging the Home Office’s removals policy and the lack of protection for vulnerable immigration detainees held in prison. Philip also worked within immigration/asylum law and represented individuals throughout their initial asylum/ human rights claims and subsequent Tribunal appeals.