Robert Alexander Courts KC (born 21 October 1978) is a British Conservative politician and barrister who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Witney from 2016 to 2024.
His father Ian Courts is a solicitor, company director, and the Conservative leader of Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council.
[3][4] Courts was privately educated at Berkhamsted School, where he was head of Fry's House, before studying law at the University of Sheffield.
[5] He was called to the Bar at Lincoln's Inn in 2003 and practises as a barrister at 3PB Chambers principally in the fields of personal injury/clinical negligence and public and regulatory law.
He is credited by the House of Commons library with helping to lead the "parliamentary pressure" that led to the announcement of the Ministry of Defence's Combat Air Strategy, the programme for the eventual replacement of the Eurofighter Typhoon.
[18] In October 2018, the Parliamentary commissioner for standards found Courts had breached rules by using official stationery in campaign updates.
Courts has said that EDMs are generally tabled by MPs on behalf of "lobbyists or groups keen to show themselves as doing something", that they are "politically impotent" and a waste of taxpayers' money.
However he returned to government on 7 December 2023 as Solicitor General for England and Wales, receiving the customary appointment as King's Counsel on 24 January 2024.