From July this year New Zealand legal practitioners will be asked to keep a ‘professional diary’ outlining their Continuing Legal Education (CLE) undertakings during the past year.

The Law Society has not previously required practitioners to undertake CLE, but has decided to introduce the diary requirement following high turnouts to their CLE programs in the past. “Based on our records 90-95% of practitioners attend CLE courses already,” said NZ Law Society president, Jonathan Temm. “But, we were concerned with the frequency of attendance to CLE courses and the need for lawyers to be informed about new laws and changes to existing laws.”

The diary will be inspected by the Law Society when practitioners apply for their annual practicing certificates. After studying overseas legal society CLE requirements the NZ Law Society decided to take a different approach and will not have a points or hours requirement attached to the CLE diary. “What we are designing is a system where each lawyer can identify on their own what they need to do to further their career,” said Temm. “The emphasis is on the individual practitioner, rather than being on the number of points.”

Lawyers who cannot show any evidence of CLE will be asked to demonstrate to the Law Society why they should receive a new practicing certificate. There are approximately 11,000 lawyers with certificates in New Zealand and the program will be introduced across the board over three years, added Temm.

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