New Zealand's Crown Law Merry-Go-Round of Legal Fees

How many NZ$millions of tax-payers' money was paid to NZ Government lawyers during covid?

In this article, I use a number of recent Official Information Act (OIA) responses to summarise a merry-go-round of money paid by just four of New Zealand Government departments, for legal advice and representation. (Other Depts’ costs to follow)

‘Merry-Go-Round’: Image by Ran Berkovich via Unsplash (2018, Public Domain)

Back in November last year, I wrote-up some research about Large Law Firms NZ Ltd. New subscribers (welcome!) are encouraged to read those posts, to understand the extent of the power of the legal profession in NZ to control the Five Eyes propaganda and narrative:

NZ Government Lawyers: Crown Law

What is ‘Crown Law’? Crown Law is one of six core justice sector agencies along with Ministry of Justice, Department of Corrections, New Zealand Police, Ministry for Children and the Serious Fraud Office. Crown Law focuses on criminal, public and administrative law. They assist the Solicitor General with the conduct of criminal appeals and the supervision and oversight (pun intended) of public prosecutions. They apparently ‘provide strategic leadership’ across the government legal system and support the Government Legal Network and the Solicitor General’s leadership of the legal profession across the Crown.

From its website:

The Crown Law Office provides legal advice and representation services to the government in matters affecting the executive government, particularly in the areas of criminal, public and administrative law. The services provided include matters covering judicial review of government actions, constitutional questions including Treaty of Waitangi issues, the enforcement of criminal law, and protection of the revenue. The Office administers the prosecution process in the criminal justice system, in particular, Crown prosecutions.

The Office has two primary purposes in providing these services:

• to ensure that the operations and responsibilities of the executive government are conducted lawfully, and

• to ensure that the government is not prevented, through legal process, from lawfully implementing its chosen policies and discharging its governmental responsibilities. (my emphasis)

Two things stand out from Crown Law’s latest Annual Report. Firstly, its involvement with the ongoing NZ ‘Covid Inquiry’, which as anyone who has been following the Scottish and UK versions via

biologyphenom

posts will know, is unlikely to be broadcast ‘mainstream’ or result in any meaningful outcomes or accountability. For instance, see this quote:

The purpose of Phase One of the Royal Commission is to strengthen New Zealand’s preparedness for, and response to, any future pandemic by identifying those lessons learned from New Zealand’s response to COVID-19 that should be applied in preparation for any future pandemic. This phase will make recommendations on measures to best prepare New Zealand to respond to any future pandemics. (my emphasis)

Indeed.

The second thing that stands out from this Annual Report is their work on reinforcing the UN SDGs ‘Climate Change’ agenda. Because, apparently…

Climate change is a dynamic and rapidly developing area of law. There continues to be an increase in litigation against government decision makers based on concerns about the sufficiency of climate change mitigation efforts. This increase reflects wider global trends, which show an increasing number of cases across more jurisdictions.(my emphasis)

It’s no secret or surprise that Crown Law has been busy over the past five years, trying to defend the NZ Government’s indefensible, unethical ‘covid response’ laws on behalf of itself. For instance, in the case Free To Be Church Trust v Minister for COVID-19 Response, the High Court found that the covid-19 ‘jab pass’ or ‘Vaccination’ Certificate-related gathering restrictions on church-goers “were a justified limit on the right to manifest religion”. Free To Be Church appealed BUT the Court of Appeal dismissed this appeal. These judgments reflect a repeated and confused opinion by NZ judges that covid was ‘an emergency’ and therefore Human Rights, including attending mass, were prohibited. As we know, many anti-discriminatory employment laws were also dismissed, eg see the teachers case. But those fights continue. We will not give up.

Before I write a follow-up to the above post about Large Law Firms NZ Ltd, including how much each of these Government depts paid to external lawyers over the covid era, I thought I’d summarise today how much they have paid themselves with our money.

Let’s look at four examples from these NZ Government departments:

• Ministry of Education (MoE)

• Ministry of Social Development (MSD)

• Ministry of Primary Industries (MPI)

• Ministry of Health (MoH)

Looking at this graph, readers may agree that the MoH stands out as a subject of further investigation?

At the height of the [uh hum] ‘global pandemic’, the NZ Ministry of HEALTH could have been focusing its outgoings on public health provision? But during that time, its legal costs with Crown Law alone, increased by approx. 762% - from NZ$290k p/a in 2019/20 to NZ$2.5m in 2021/22. Why?

One clue is found in the timing. The ‘vaccine’ mandates for NZ healthcare staff were instigated in the middle of that financial year, in November 2021, when these outgoings apparently peaked. You can read more about those traumatic mandates and the complexities of the ‘exemptions’ issue here:

Internal MoH Departmental Budget spend over this period also increased. As this graph taken from the OIA data shows:

The actual figures were $1,155,174 in 2019/20, increasing to $2,753,192 in 2022/3. An increase of 138% in internal costs of legal advice and representation.

Details and a thorough breakdown of those costs are a subject for another day. But these figures provide us with some clear insights into what was going on at leadership level at the MoH during this time. Which of the unethical, potentially illegal decisions were being pushed-back, and ‘considered’ by these costly ‘legal advisors’? How could this be justified? How many staff knew full well their decisions would have enormous and long-lasting consequences - for staff and patients? We know, for instance, that Large Law Firms NZ Ltd were providing school governors at this time, with template letters for staff non-compliant with the ‘no jab, no job’ policies. I documented that evidence here:

We can be confident that similar communications were also passing between senior management at the MoH and other Gov depts. We know also that corporate giants like Fonterra and The Warehouse Group were in secret liaisons with Government at that time subjecting their staff to intense coercion to ‘get the jab’. Lots of these jigsaw pieces are coming together now. When we understand the ‘How’ we know that accountability must come next for the ‘Who’. The names include Dr Ashley Bloomfield (DG of Health), Astrid Koorneef (Director of National Ops) and Caroline McElnay (Director Public Health). For example, evidence here.

Other legal costs

Finally, it’s no surprise that internal legal budgets and expenditures for Gov depts like the MoH have increased significantly over the covid era. These OIAs reveal that combined five-year costs of in-house provision of legal work for all four of these Government depts was an additional ~$81m. Astonishing.

In terms of external lawyers fees, some of which (like Buddle Findlay) feature in the Large Law Firms NZ Ltd list (see article at the top of this post), this is a graph showing the five years data for total costs, rising from approx. $350k p/a before the covid era response, to it’s current figure of over NZ$1million:

More on this legal costs issue soon. Meanwhile, help me help others in need of research writing and evidence: Please Buy Me a Coffee here. Thank you!

References: MoE OIA Ref 1339941; MSD OIA response dated 04/02/2025; MPI OIA ref: OIA24-0858; MoH OIA Ref: H2024058848