Members and former members of the legal profession were among those who received honours in the 2019 Queen's Birthday Honours, and Juanita Timutimu was honoured for services to criminal justice programmes.
Ivan Kwok has become an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to the State. Mr Kwok worked for The Treasury from 1975 until 2016 and provided service to successive governments and Ministers of Finance. He is a former Treasury Solicitor and was Principal Advisor from 2005 until June 2016. During his career he made a substantial contribution to most of the major economic issues facing New Zealand and the Crown, which have included superannuation schemes, commercial loans, debt-raising, institutional structure, sale and financing of Crown agencies, and the rescue package for Air New Zealand.
Mr Kwok has been involved with commercial law reform and has contributed to the Law Commission and the Regulatory Advisory Committee.
Briar Elizabeth Roycroft Gordon has become a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to the law and the State. Dr Gordon works at the Parliamentary Counsel Office and has also worked with the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment and the Crown Law Office. Admitted as a barrister and solicitor in June 1990, she has developed significant expertise in environmental law and Treaty of Waitangi law.
Dr Gordon was an original author of Brookers Resource Management in 1991 and has continued as a contributing author. She has worked as an adjunct lecturer in law at Victoria University of Wellington and has also written on Treaty of Waitangi matters. Since 1994 she has led the development of standard clauses in Treaty of Waitangi claims to streamline and provide consistency among the settlements of various iwi.
Ruth Busch has become a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to domestic violence prevention and the State. Ms Busch was an Associate Professor of Law at the University of Waikato from 1987 to 2012. Since her retirement, she has continued to advocate for changes to legal treatment of domestic violence by the justice system and runs two free family law clinics that assist families experiencing domestic violence. Ms Busch was involved in the founding of the Hamilton Abuse Intervention Project, a domestic violence NGO that was the first of its kind in New Zealand.
In 1992 Ms Busch co-produced a report on the Domestic Protection Act 1982, which proposed many law changes that ultimately formed the basis of the Domestic Violence Act 1995. In 1994, she also worked on the Bristol Ministerial Inquiry that led to the enactment of violence provisions in the Care of Children Act. Ten years later, she was commissioned by the Ministry of Women's Affairs (now Ministry for Women) to review the law on protection orders. In 2018, she joined the Ministry of Justice's Expert Reference Group that examines the efficacy of family justice reforms implemented in 2014.
Philip Ivan Redmond has received the Queen's Service Medal for services to the community. Mr Redmond was Honorary Solicitor over more than 30 years for a range of organisations and societies, which included Kaiapoi Budget Advisory Service, Kaiapoi Railway Station Trust, Kaiapoi RSA, Kaiapoi Promotion Association, and various sports clubs.
Mr Redmond has been Chairman of the MV Tuhoe Kaiapoi Rivertown Trust since 2005. He is the longest serving Board member of Big Brothers Big Sisters of North Canterbury. He has been Chairman of the Rotary Charitable Trust of Rangiora since 2014. He is a Life Member and Patron of Coastguard North Canterbury. He was a foundation Board member of Waimakariri Youth Initiatives Trust for 10 years. He was President of Canterbury Sunday Soccer League in 1980. Mr Redmond was a Kaiapoi Borough Councillor from 1980 to 1985 and is a current member of the Kaiapoi Tuahiwi Community Board of the Waimakariri District Council.
Juanita Whitiaera Timutimu has received the Queen's Service Medal for services to criminal justice programmes and the community. Ms Timutimu is the Māori Responsiveness Advisor for the New Zealand Police and has supported work within the reintegration of former inmates into the community.
She has helped to direct the formation of several criminal justice programmes such as the ATAWHAI Youth Mentoring Programme that involved an intense fitness training schedule. She has engaged positively with the wider community and the programme has involved volunteers from the New Zealand Police, Fire and Emergency Service, New Zealand Army, and the Māori Wardens. She has two other youth mentoring programmes Qmunity Youth which mentors LGBTQI+ youth and Tuakana Teina, which is mentoring for youth with a parent in prison. Ms Timutimu has organised Te Pae Oranga (Iwi Panels).