The Library offers New Zealand lawyers holding a practising certificate, fast, efficient and thorough research on any legal subject.

Our experienced legal researchers are based at the Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch Research Libraries. The service is supported by the Library's comprehensive collection of New Zealand and overseas material. See our library catalogue and online resources.

How to request research

Contact your nearest library or use our online research request form.
Any research library can undertake your request. Charges apply (information on how to pay is included on the invoice).

Note: Provision of urgent research will depend on sufficient capacity at the time a request is made.

Research results

Research results are usually provided in the form of case summaries, selected cases, commentary (extracts from loose leaf titles, texts, articles, Law Commission reports etc). We will also provide a concise summary of resources consulted and what our research has found or not found (if relevant).

NB. We do not provide legal opinions

Once you have reviewed your research results, do not hesitate to contact us to discuss options for further research if this is required.

Provide us with as much information as possible

Cases / articles / extracts / legislation

• Please provide the full citation or as many details as possible
• Let us know if you would like the cases copied in a particular way (e.g. for court)

Research

• Clearly define your research request. What is your question?
• What type of information do you require?
  e.g. case law and commentary, just case law, words and phrases, recent journal articles
• Which jurisdiction/s would you like covered?
  e.g. New Zealand, Australia, England, Canada
• Which court level are you interested in?
  e.g. Court of Appeal and Supreme Court only, High Court and above, guideline judgments only
• Is there any relevant section of an Act?
• Give us a brief background to your request to provide us with context
• Tell us if you have already done some research
  e.g. let us know not to search particular Thomson Reuters or Lexis Nexis titles
• Do you suspect there will be a lot of information or very little?

Also let us know

• Deadlines - when you need your request delivered by
• Preferred delivery method, if other than email
• How long should we spend – what is your time or money limit?