Welcome to the first quarterly edition of LawTalk for 2020. We’re really pleased to be back in print after nearly six months of digital only. Thank you for your patience over the past few months as we’ve navigated the impacts of covid.
The decision to move away from publishing 11 times a year to just four has been made in response to feedback from readers as well as rising costs, particularly when it comes to postage. It means we can continue to print LawTalk and focus on high quality content that is relevant to you.
Some of the content that was in LawTalk will move to LawPoints, our weekly email to all practising lawyers. Three regular features of LawTalk that will no longer be in the magazine are On the Move, Lawyers Complaints Service and Wills notices. These items will be published in LawPoints.
Alongside reducing the number of times we publish LawTalk, we are also streamlining the number of copies that are issued. Firms will no longer receive a copy for every lawyer with a practising certificate. Instead you’ll receive a proportionate number for the size of your organisation. We have had a number of firms tell us this is what they prefer and it will be more sustainable in the long run, both environmentally and economically.
LawTalk will continue to be published online as a flipbook and individual articles.
Te ao hurihuri
This edition is a very special one for LawTalk/Kōrero Mō te Ture. To mark Te Wiki o te Reo Māori and our Memorandum of Understanding with Te Hunga Rōia Māori o Aotearoa, that was signed earlier this year, we have partnered with the outgoing Presidents to co-edit the magazine.
Te ao hurihuri (the changing world) is an apt theme for this edition given the year that we are living through. At the Law Society we are changing too – adapting to new ways of working, to new ways of communicating and collaborating.
Within this edition you will find a range of articles that touch on the role of tikanga and te reo Māori in different aspects of the law. We are grateful to the writers who have taken the time to share their thoughts in such an open way.
More of our changing world
In this edition we also look at the changes that Aotearoa could be coming under depending on the result of the upcoming election. We’ve asked all the parties for their key objectives in the justice portfolio, their plans in relation to access to justice and how they would improve the courts and court processes.
We also take a look at the End of Life Choice Act which is one of two referendums running alongside the general election.
For our series on mental health we have a range of views from three different legal professionals along the theme of Mental Health Awareness Week which falls near the end of September.
Rounding off this edition we have an interview with the son in law of Shirley Smith, the first woman in New Zealand to lecture in law and become a full member of a law faculty. She was also the first editor of the Victoria University of Wellington Law Review and one of the first women to open a sole legal practice. A woman who carved a pathway for others, changing the world for those who followed.