He studied law and had a doctoral place at the Cambridge Institute of Criminology and then moved to the Leo Baeck College to train as a rabbi.
He received rabbinic ordination (semichah) in 1972[2] from rabbis John Rayner, Hugo Gryn and Louis Jacobs.
After ten years as a congregational rabbi at North West Surrey Synagogue, Bayfield became director of the Sternberg Centre for Judaism in Finchley in 1985.
[5][6] Bayfield was awarded a CBE in the 2011 New Year Honours List for services to Reform Judaism.
[4] Tony Bayfield married Linda Rose, a teacher and Jewish educator in 1969; she died in 2003.