Top lawyer making a difference

Miriam Dean. Photo / Supplied

Auckland lawyer Miriam Dean, QC, has capped off a year in which she has overseen the Government's billion-dollar investment in high-speed broadband and the creation of the Auckland Super City by being made a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to law and business.

The current and first woman president of the Bar Association was a member of the Auckland Transition Authority before being appointed a company director on one of the new Auckland Council controlled organisations managing the council's investments portfolio.

She is also a director of Crown Fibre Holdings, the Government's investment vehicle responsible for managing the introduction of ultra-fast broadband to urban areas.

Dean said she had thoroughly enjoyed the directorship roles because they were more constructive than the litigation.

"I feel like I can actually add some value, make a difference."

Dean was the first woman partner at what was then known as Russell McVeagh McKenzie Bartlett in 1987, before going out as a barrister sole in 1995.

Through the 1980s she was the firm's sole woman litigator, a situation that has now reversed with Russell McVeagh's litigation team dominated by women.

Speaking to the Herald this year, Dean said there was a growing recognition that the often understated, holistic approach sometimes favoured by women in law - as opposed to the aggressive male stereotype - could be far more effective. More and more cases were being resolved outside the court structure.