Moot competition highlights tikanga and water rights

Māori ownership rights over water and other contemporary social justice issues were hotly debated at the University of Auckland versus AUT Social Issues Moot 2023.

Sponsored by Simpson Grierson, the competition saw law students hone their mooting skills in teams of two. They also got to take part in a wānanga organised by Simpson Grierson Partner Jo-Anne Knight and Solicitor Avary Patutama (both Auckland Law School alumni), which covered tikanga in the justice system, how to introduce yourself in te reo Māori, and Māori issues in court.

Third-year University of Auckland Faculty of Law students Charlie Matthews and Jimin Seo stood out throughout the competition and found themselves up against their good friends and fellow UoA law students Henry Fitzgerald and Kevin Qian in the semifinals.

“Henry and Kevin are our good mates, so it was great to moot against them,” says Charlie, who is studying towards a conjoint Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Laws.

“As Kevin says, 我们不打不相识 which basically translates to ‘we get to know each other through our battles.’”

In their final battle of the contest, the fictional problem, written by Jo-Anne Knight, was about water running from a headwater on Māori freehold land, which was being extracted from bores located on adjoining land.

The question focused on the jurisdiction of the Māori Land Court over water, Māori ownership in water, and the weight given to the principles of Te Tiriti o Waitangi when interpreting Te Ture Whenua Māori Act 1993.

According to the judges, both sides presented well-developed, clear arguments, and after a longer-than-anticipated deliberation, the court ruled in favour of the counsel for the respondents, Charlie and Jimin.

The biggest takeaway of the mooting competition, says Jimin, was learning to embrace and respond to the judges’ questions.

“The competition helped me to realise what oral advocacy is all about.”

The back-and-forth between the teams and the judges (Judge Belinda Pidwell, consultant Gerald Lanning, and partner Jo-Anne Knight) also helped the students hone their speaking skills, says Charlie.

“It was a great opportunity to learn from some of the best people in the field, and the whole experience was super insightful. Mooting is a really interesting and interactive way to learn the law.”

Sponsoring and helping to organise the social issues moot was also a great learning experience for the Simpson Grierson team.

“Identifying a suitable topic for this moot, one that was legally and socially relevant and sufficiently challenging, was a great learning opportunity for us here at SG,” says people and culture consultant Sophia Catley.

“Engaging with tauira studying law and those about to start their legal careers always presents a wonderful opportunity for us to reflect on what we do as lawyers, why we are doing it, and what our hopes are for the future of the law in Aotearoa.

“We would also like to take the opportunity to say how impressed we all were with the professionalism and wise leadership demonstrated by the mooting society organisers. Working with them was such a pleasure, and we hope we can do it again.”