Frazer Barton is the new President of the New Zealand Law Society’s Otago branch.
Elected the branch’s Vice-President last year, Mr Barton is chair of the Anderson Lloyd board and the head of the firm’s Dunedin litigation team.
He has always been a litigation specialist and specialises in court work and enjoys the challenge of advocacy.
“Working within the area of litigation involves a lot of variety, which means no two cases are the same and I enjoy the resulting challenge,” he says.
His career has involved many personal highlights.
“Working on a case that was heard in the Privy Council in London which involved a commercial partner and a breach of trade is one of the more significant examples,” he says.
“Another was being involved with a professional negligence case that resulted in a hearing in the Supreme Court, and I acted for the organiser of a cycle race which involved the death of a competitor. That particular case went all the way to the Court of Appeal and resulted in an acquittal.”
His litigation has included civil, quasi-criminal, insurance with a professional indemnity emphasis, insolvency, commercial disputes, family protection and estates.
Mr Barton graduated from Otago University with a BA and an LLB with First Class Honours, specialising in public law. He was admitted in January 1985 and worked as a solicitor in Christchurch before moving to Dunedin where he became a partner in Anderson Lloyd’s predecessor firm in 1988.
He has been a faculty member of the NZLS CLE Ltd Litigation Skills Programme since 1995.
He is a member and former chair of the board of Presbyterian Support Otago and is a member of the New Zealand Insurance Law Association.
Married with three children and three grandchildren (who also live in Dunedin), Mr Barton’s time outside of law is spent landscaping his family’s new home and spending time at their crib in Naseby, Central Otago.
Following the branch’s annual general meeting on 10 June, the following were also elected: Vice-President, John Farrow; Immediate Past President, David Robinson; Otago University Law Faculty representative, Donna Buckingham; OWLS representative, Kimberly Jarvis; Central Otago representative, Dale Lloyd; Oamaru representative, Nicky Sinclair; new practitioners representative, Adam Keith; Council: Taryn Gudmanz, Craig Power, David Sim, Lucia Vincent and Jo Hambleton.