Victoria leads complex litigation, with a particular focus on public law.
I joined the independent bar in 2012, becoming a QC in 2016. I have previously worked as Crown Counsel with the Crown Law Office’s Tax & Commercial and Human Rights Teams, and with Bell Gully (Auckland and Wellington offices), Meredith Connell (Auckland) and Sly and Weigall (Canberra).
Recent cases
- PATHA v Minister of Health [2025] NZHC 4045 and [2026] NZCA 8 (challenge to ban on puberty blockers for transgender young people, interim orders)
- D v Attorney-General [2025] NZHC 4028 (order of mandamus against Chief Executive of the Dept of Corrections requiring him to comply with the Corrections Act)
- Grinder v Attorney-General [2025] NZSC 165, [2025] 1 NZLR 1062 (community safety threshold for special conditions of parole for offenders sentenced to preventative detention)
- Oxley v Wellington Pride Festival Inc [2025] NZHRRT 36 and 38 (discrimination claim, non-publication and related matters)
- Chief Executive of the Department of Corrections v Jones [2025] NZCA 457, [2025] 3 NZLR 318 (prerequisites for prisoner transfers)
- Courage v J [2025] NZHC 2461 (statutory immunity of public servants, strike out)
- Lawyers for Climate Act NZ v Climate Change Commission [2025] 2 NZLR 80, [2025] NZRMA 258, [2025] NZAR 115 (CA) and [2022] NZAR 115 (HC), leave declined [2025] NZSC 200 (successful opposition by the Commission to judicial review application and appeal concerning its advice on the emissions budgets and NZ’s nationally determined contribution under the Paris Agreement)
- Te Ohu Kai Moana Trustee Ltd v Attorney-General [2025] NZHC 657, [2025] 2 NZLR 382, [2025] NZRMA 190, [2025] NZAR 283 (successful claim that Crown has been acting in breach of the 1992 Fisheries Settlement and must provide redress), also [2024] NZHC 2521 (interim orders decision) and [2025] NZHC 3448 (costs)
- New Zealand Law Society v Legal Complaints Review Officer [2025] NZHC 433 (opposing NZLS judicial review of LCRO)
- Dotcom v Attorney-General [2024] NZCA 260, [2023] NZHC 3105, [2023] NZHC 1122, [2022] NZHRRT 7, [2020] NZCA 551 and [2019] 2 NZLR 277 (HC) (privacy and damages)
- Major Gas User’s Group v Commerce Commission [2024] NZHC 959 (successful defence of appeal against Input Methodology decisions under Part 4 of the Commerce Act)
- Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society v Waka Kotahi [2024] NZSC 26 (resource management, the New Zealand Coastal Policy Statement and the East West link project)
- Donnelly v Fire and Emergency New Zealand [2024] NZERA 572 (backpay for former employees)
- Hudson v Attorney-General [2023] NZCA 653 (successful appeal, judicial review, prisoners’ rights and freedom of expression)
- Wallace v Chief Executive of Dept of Corrections [2023] NZHC 2248 (successful claim that Dept of Corrections’ conversion of Arohata Womens’ Prison to a remand centre and closure of the only Drug Treatment Unit for sentenced women was discriminatory and unlawful). Also: relief judgment [2023] NZHC; interim orders judgment [2022] NZHC 2464; and costs [2023] NZHC 2830
- Port Otago Limited v Environmental Defence Society Inc [2023] NZSC 112 (resource management: the ‘avoid’ policies in the New Zealand Coastal Policy Statement)
- New Zealand Nurses Organisation v Te Whatu Ora Health New Zealand (representing Te Whatu Ora in pay equity related claims for nursing workforce in the Employment Court and Employment Relations Authority)
- Ryan v Health and Disability Commissioner [2023] NZSC 42, on appeal from [2021] NZCA 347 and [2020] NZHC 373 (vicarious liability of GP practice for breaches of the patients’ Code of rights under the Health and Disability Commissioner Act)
- Van Silfhout v Pathirannehelage [2023] NZCA 5 and [2021] NZHC 2268 (counsel assisting the Court, Prisoners and Victims Claims Act 2005)
- Te Rūnunga O Ngāi Tahu v Te Ohu Kai Moana Trustee Ltd [2023] NZHC 302 (judicial review application relating to proposed changes to Māori fisheries settlement distribution model)
- Stafford v Attorney General [2022] NZCA 165 (representing Kāinga Ora in judicial review relating to Ministers’ powers to direct Crown Entities, fiduciary claims for historical Treaty breaches). See also Stafford v Attorney-General [2021] NZHC 335 and 1466; [2022] NZSC 108.
- WorkSafe v National Emergency Management Agency [2022] NZDC 8020 (successful application to dismiss charges against NEMA in relation to Whakaari eruption)
- K v Complaints Assessment Committee [2022] NZHC 307 (scope of functus officio in disciplinary investigative process)
- Trans-Tasman Resources Ltd v Taranaki-Whanganui Conservation Board [2021] NZSC 127 (representing the EPA in an appeal against a consent for off-shore iron sands mining under the Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) Act 2012 (first and second appeals at [2020] NZCA 86 and [2018] NZHC 2217)
- Environmental Protection Authority v BWO Offshore Singapore Ptd Ltd [2021] NZHC 2577 (correct approach to costs against a regulator in the Environment Court)
- Jonathon Livingston Engineering Co Ltd v Commissioner of Patents [2021] NZHC 2542 (counsel assisting the Court, patent appeal)
- Peters v Attorney-General [2021] NZCA 355, and Peters v Bennett [2020] NZHC 761 and 1734 (successful defence of tort of privacy claim by Rt Hon Winston Peters against State Services Commissioner and former CE MSD)
- New Zealand Post Primary Teachers Assoc v Secretary for Education [2021] NZEmpC 87 (claim that collective agreement discriminated against part time secondary school teachers on the basis of sex)
- Registrar of Real Estate Agents Authority v Cavanagh [2021] NZHC 680 (fit and proper person test for registration)
- New Zealand Professional Firefighters Union Inc v Fire and Emergency New Zealand [2021] NZCA 60 (successful opposition to leave to appeal on restructuring provisions in governing legislation)
- Greymouth Gas Turangi Ltd v Minister of Energy and Resources [2020] NZHC 2712 (judicial review, offshore petroleum exploration permits and the government announcement of the ban on future off-shore exploration)
- Borrowdale v Director-General of Health [2020] NZHC 2090 (representing the Director-General and others in defending a challenge to the 2020 COVID-19 lockdown and subsequent Level 3 response)
- Hospice New Zealand v Attorney-General [2020] NZHC 1379 (rights of conscientious objection for institutions under proposed End of Life Choice Act)
- Taylor v Chief Executive of Dept of Corrections [2020] NZHC 383 (meaning of personal information under the Privacy Act)
Other Matters
Lead counsel for All of Government engagement with Phase 2 of the NZ Royal Commission COIVD-19 Lessons Learned, 2024 – 2025
Representing National Emergency Management Agency in Coronial Inquiries into the deaths from the December 2019 eruption of Whakaari / White Island, ongoing
Representing National Emergency Management Agency in Coronial Inquiries into the deaths from the 2023 North Island Severe Weather Events, ongoing
Independent review of the detention of asylum seekers in New Zealand, 23 March 2022
Independent investigation on instructions from the High Performance Sport NZ Independent Complaints Service, 2021 (application for judicial review of same declined: Thompson v Canoe Racing New Zealand Inc [2022] 1533)
Independent Review of processes and proceedings for making refugee protection status determinations under Part 5 of the Immigration Act 2009, Report 2019
Assistant Commissioner of Patents, Trade Marks and Plant Designs, 2015 – 2018
Panel member litigation strategy review of government agency (2018)
Independent peer review of investigation into serious complaints against a senior executive (2018)
Chair of the Minimum Taste Standard Committee appointed by the New Zealand Kiwifruit Board inquiring into a complaint against Zespri (2017)
Represented Hastings District Council in Stage 2 of the Government Inquiry into Havelock North Drinking Water (2017)
Appointed counsel assisting the Government Inquiry by the Hon Lester Chisholm into allegations regarding the Hon Judith Collins and a former Director of the Serious Fraud Office (2014)
Seminars and Publications
Mastering Cross-examination workshop faculty member November 2025
Prisoner Rights Litigation, panel presentation NZ Bar Association Conference September 2025
Litigation Panel, Rainbow Law May 2025
Pink Ribbon Breakfast panel August 2024
Tikanga and the Law – recent developments in house presentation for regulatory decision maker July 2024
IPONZ decision making in house presentation March 2024
Seminars for Crown Entities on developments in the law relating to tikanga and Te Tiriti, 2023 – 24
Judicial Review: Recent Cases and Developments Chair of session Legalwise seminar November 2023
Climate Change Litigation (Crown Law Office) March 2023
Prison Panorama panel discussion Wellington Branch NZLS Parole Law Committee March 2022
Emergency Powers and the Role of the Advocate NZ Bar Association Conference 2022
Judicial Review: recent cases and trends Legalwise Government Law Conference September 2022
Duncan Cotterill Public Sector Forum Personal information November 2019
Member planning group for Human Rights Law – New Frontiers NZLS CLE Intensive May 2019
Discovery in Judicial Review (presentation to the Crown Law Office) November 2018
Panel speaker The Rule of Law NZ Bar Association Conference September 2018
Public Law Claims NZCLE In Short seminar August 2018
Employment Court Workshop August 2018
Seminars on Parliamentary Privilege in the context of litigation, July – August 2017, NZCLE February 2018
NZCLE Public Sector Governance Intensive: When things go wrong – responding to external investigations 26 October 2017
Government Legal Network Health Law: Collisions between science, social policy, economics and ethics 22 March 2017
Judicial Review 2016 in review Legalwise seminar 2 March 2017
Judicial Review in practice (presentation to the Crown Law Office) September 2016
Administrative Law 2015 in review Legalwise seminar 25 February 2016.
Victoria University cross-campus human rights symposium paper: ‘The right to die’ and ‘rational suicide’: respecting human rights for all or a claim for privilege by the strong? The case for the status quo’ 10 December 2015, paper published [2015] HRR 10.
Gathering and disposing of information under the Inquiries Act 2013 NZLS Public Law Intensive 8 October 2015
The Legal Framework for Administrative Decision Making, Legalwise seminar 8 September 2015
Recent cases and developments in administrative law, Legalwise seminar, 24 February 2015
Article on the use of electronic bundles in the High Court, LawTalk, 7 June 2013.
Judicial Review seminars for Visiting Justices (Royal Federation of Justices) and Hearing Adjudicators (Dept of Corrections), 2008 to 2010.
Paper on the extraterritorial effect of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990, presented to a joint seminar of Government lawyers and members of the Refugee Status Appeals Authority, 2009.
Community and Professional
Former council member, New Zealand Bar Association (2021 – 2025)
Honorary member Wellington Pride Festival Inc
Contact Victoria Casey KC
Level 2 Solnet House
70 The Terrace
Wellington 6011
PO Box 5621
Wellington 6140
Phone: +64 4 212 4679
Mobile: +64 21 0299 5428
victoria.casey@cliftonchambers.co.nz
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