NZBA receives funding to study gender ratio of lawyers appearing in top courts
NZBA is pleased to announce it has received a grant from The New Zealand Law Foundation to fund research into the gender ratio of lawyers appearing in the Court of Appeal and Supreme Court.
The research will establish the gender ratios of both senior and junior lawyers appearing in both appellate Courts between 1 January 2012 and 1 January 2018. This data will provide useful insight into the extent to which male lawyers appear in these courts more frequently than female lawyers, and whether there is a different gender ratio for those appearing as senior counsel as opposed to junior counsel. “There is much anecdotal evidence about these issues but little data exists” says Jenny Cooper QC from the NZBA’s Gender Equity Committee, who will lead the research. “By giving us a better understanding of the current position and how it has changed over the last 6 years the research will enable us to better target and measure the success of strategies to increase the role of women as courtroom advocates.”
The NZBA is grateful to The Law Foundation for its generous support of this initiative. The approval of the funding coincides with the launch of the NZBA and NZLS’s joint Gender Equitable Engagement and Instruction Policy at events in Auckland and Wellington on Tuesday 5 December 2017. The current Co-Chairs of the NZBA Gender Equity Committee, James Farmer QC and Kate Davenport QC (President-Elect of the NZBA), are hopeful that the data that will emerge from this research will shed greater light on gender equity issues in the legal profession and encourage more users and providers of legal services to support the policy.
Contact: Jenny Cooper QC, jcooper@shortlandchambers.co.nz, ph 021 632260
