George Gretton

George Lidderdale Gretton WS LLB (born 1950) is a Scottish lawyer and academic and, from May 2006 to May 2011, was a Commissioner of the Scottish Law Commission.

Educated at West House School and King Edward's, Birmingham, he read Philosophy and English Literature at the University of Durham and Law at the University of Edinburgh. He was appointed to the Lord President Reid Chair in Law at Edinburgh University in 1994. He has published widely on commercial law, property law, trusts, insolvency law, comparative law and legal history; he is a Solicitor, a Notary Public and a Writer to the Signet.

He is the author of several textbooks on conveyancing (co-written with former Scottish Law Commissioner, Professor Kenneth Reid); the law of inhibitions and adjudications (the diligences, or mechanisms for enforcing judgments, affecting land in Scotland); and searches.

At the Scottish Law Commission, Professor Gretton was the lead commissioner for the project considering reform to the Scottish system of land registration. This project proved most successful, resulting in a comprehensive report published in 2010. The report was received favorably by the Scottish Parliament, and the majority of its recommendations were enacted into the Land Registration etc. (Scotland) Act 2012, which came into force in December 2014. This new Act repealed much of the previous law under the Land Registration (Scotland) Act 1979, which the Report highlighted as inadequate.

He is married with three children.

He and Professor Kenneth Reid have known each other since they were both students together at the University of Edinburgh.