New Zealand Law Society - Arthur Young celebrates 60 years as Chapman Tripp partner

Arthur Young celebrates 60 years as Chapman Tripp partner

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Chapman Tripp lawyer Arthur Young is celebrating 60 years as partner of the firm. Chapman Tripp says he is the longest serving partner who is still working in the New Zealand legal profession.

Mr Young continues to practise as head of the firm's Private Client team. Aged 84, he was admitted to the Bar on 22 March 1957. On 1 April 1959, he became a junior partner at Sheffield and Young, one of the founding firms of Chapman Tripp.

Photo of Arthur Young
Arthur Young. 

“It is incredible to reflect on the past 60 years and how the legal landscape has changed. Early on, it was the days of stamp duty and death duty, and trying to trim those down, going to the Land Transfer Office in person to have the memorials written up in the great heavy ledgers, turning up to have the registrations, and you had to get there at 8am to be ahead of the queue," he says.

“Lots of law has changed enormously, but actually much is the same. Our work involves dealing with people, and human nature, if it changes at all, is only gradual in its change.”

A former President of the Auckland University Students Association in 1958-59, he received the University’s Distinguished Alumni Award in 2002. Arthur is a long standing member of the Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners.

Arthur worked with his first principal, Joe Sheffield, for 25 years, and he had a huge influence on Arthur’s career. “What he imbued in me was the client comes first, that you have to do the best for the client, and that it doesn’t matter who they are. It has stuck with me and I still try and live up to that.”

Arthur still works full time and has no firm plans to retire. He says jokingly, “I am in the second half of my career.

“I keep working partly for the intellectual stimulation, partly the sense of wanting to do the best thing for the clients, but a major thing is the people I work with. We have a wonderful team.”

Chief Executive Partner Nick Wells adds, “His intellectual rigour, unfailing enthusiasm, wide experience and dedication to service has helped shaped Chapman Tripp into the firm it is today. His private clients trust and rely on his judgment, gentlemanly approach and personal touch.”

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