New Zealand lawyer Janet Mason, who was appointed as counsel assisting the Ashton-Lewis Commission of Inquiry, has been suspended from legal practice in New Zealand for the month of August.
The ruling of High Court judge Justice Geoffrey Venning was issued on July 18 and reduces the three-month suspension ordered against Ms Mason by a disciplinary tribunal last year.
The case began in 2020 when New Zealand High Court judge Peter Churchman issued a ruling referring Ms Mason’s conduct in a High Court case to the New Zealand Law Society.
A lawyers’ standards committee found in 2022 that Ms Mason’s conduct had been unsatisfactory. The committee ordered Ms Mason to take a two-day litigation skills training course.
Ms Mason did not comply with the order to take the course, saying that she would legally challenge the committee decision. However she did not challenge it.
In October 2023 the committee opened a new investigation into why Ms Mason had not complied with its orders to take the two-day course. Ms Mason said she had chosen a different two-hour training course. The committee found that Ms Mason had breached its original training orders and set down the case for hearing before a disciplinary tribunal.
According to the judgment, Ms Mason did not file her legal submissions on time. The tribunal found that her failure to comply with the training order was deliberate and “constituted a wilful breach of (professional) rules”. The tribunal ordered a hearing to take place in March this year on the penalty to be imposed on Ms Mason.
Ms Mason then filed an appeal to the High Court but was required to proceed to the penalty hearing. The tribunal ordered that she be suspended from legal practice for three months.
“The picture that emerges is that Ms Mason was antagonistic towards the requirement to undergo what she perceived as a beginner’s course and did not accept the committee’s order,” Justice Venning said. “Rather, she sought to negotiate a different outcome.
“Further, Ms Mason continued to put her work commitments ahead of her compliance with the training order. (Her lawyer) suggested that in doing so she was simply complying with her primary obligations to the court and to clients. However that overlooks the background to this matter which led to the initial first investigation,” Justice Venning said.
“That was a breach of her obligations to the court which in turn led to the training order. It also overlooks the fact that it is in the interests of clients that lawyers maintain standards and comply with the requirements and orders of their professional body.
“A lawyer cannot use a work commitment and obligation to their clients to fail to comply with professional standards and orders of disciplinary committees.
“When all factors were taken into account, the finding of an intentional breach of Ms Mason’s obligations was open to the tribunal. At the very least she was reckless as that term is used in a disciplinary context,” the judge said.
The judge noted that there were other “open complaints from a client and several former employees” against Ms Mason.
He said that in 2015 Ms Mason had been refused a practising certificate allowing her to practise on her own account because of the liquidation of the company which owned her legal practice.
“I agree with the submission that the 2015 incident, now some 10 years ago, cannot be said to amount to a pattern of behaviour as such,” the judge said.
“However it is still relevant that the same problem, namely focusing on client demands rather than her other professional obligations, appears to remain an issue for Ms Mason.”
Justice Venning ruled that the three-month suspension order against Ms Mason was excessive, “having regard to the gravity of Ms Mason’s conduct overall, her personal history and her professional obligations”.
“A one-month suspension makes the point that practitioners must comply with such orders but will reduce the impact on Ms Mason personally, and on her clients generally.
“To assist Ms Mason to organise her commitments, the order for suspension is deferred to commence 1 August 2025.”
