Annual CBA Conference - 2 & 3 August 2025
This year's Criminal Bar Association Conference will be in Auckland over the weekend of 2 and 3 August 2025. The conference sessions will be held at the University of Auckland School of Business, and the conference dinner will be held at the Cordis Hotel.
Attendance at the full conference fulfills 10 CPD hours - the full annual requirement.
Conference Speakers
This year our keynote speaker is Tim Owen KC of Matrix Chambers, a leading set in London. Tim has been a silk since 2000, and is a prominent advocate in the criminal and public law areas, particularly where they overlap with human rights issues. He has made multiple appearances before the House of Lords, Privy Council, UK Supreme Court, European Court of Human Rights and many overseas courts.
Tim is also the co-host of Double Jeopardy, a law and politics podcast that has now done over 100 episodes; it has a significant New Zealand audience.
In addition to his formal address to the Conference, Tim will be our after-dinner speaker. With over 40 years in practice and interactions with many prominent judges and lawyers, including leading a certain Keir Starmer in several prominent cases, we can expect to be informed and entertained
The speakers for this year’s conference include:
- Tim Owen KC - Rule of Law in an Age of Populism – introduced by Winkelmann CJ
- Appellate Judges Panel - Justice Kos, Justice French, Justice Fitzgerald
- Scott Optican – Evidence Law Update
- Jo Wade Lexis Nexis, Chris Wilkinson-Smith, Annabel Cresswell - AI and Criminal Law
- Fiona Guy-Kidd KC, Rachel Reed KC, and Alysha McClintock - Court of Appeal Advocacy
- Carrie Leonetti - Ensuring the Reliability of Forensic Evidence
- Henry Benson-Pope - Sentencing Changes
- Bruce Wilson - Car Crash 101
- Amanda Hill - Rights behind the wire: how (and why) to take on prison law cases
Conference Dinner
The Conference Dinner will be held at the Cordis Hotel, 83 Symonds Street, Grafton, Auckland.
Pre-dinner drinks and canapés commence at 7pm. Guests are asked to move into the dining area at 7.30pm and be seated. Our dinner speaker this year is Tim Owen KC.
The dress code for the dinner is black tie.
Accommodation
For those who are travelling from out of town, the Cordis Hotel are offering discounted accommodation options. Click here to book.
Pricing
All pricing below includes GST. For group bookings please email events@criminalbar.org.nz
Membership Type | Early bird | After 4 July |
| Members | $645.00 | $745.00 |
| Recently Admitted Member | $545.00 | $645.00 |
| Student Member - Conference and Dinner | $435.00 | $435.00 |
| Student Member - Conference Only | $155.00 | $155.00 |
| Non-Member | $850.00 | $950.00 |
This year's conference is sponsored by LexisNexis.
