Mark Hickford

Mark Hickford is a barrister based at Thorndon Chambers in Wellington, New Zealand. Mark obtained his DPhil from the University of Oxford in 1999. His first degrees were in law, history and political studies from the University of Auckland. He was the Pro Vice-Chancellor of Government, Law and Business at Victoria University of Wellington until 4 July 2023, having assumed that role from 26 October 2021. Prior to that he was the Pro Vice-Chancellor and Dean of Law from 11 May 2015. Admitted to the bar in New Zealand in 1993, he has had an extensive legal practice in both the public and private sectors since then, with specialist expertise in Māori-Crown Relations law and practice (including Treaty settlements), constitutional and public law, the Treaty of Waitangi, and indigenous rights. Mark has appeared as counsel in the senior courts (including in the landmark foreshore and seabed decision Attorney-General v Ngāti Apa), as well as in specialist jurisdictions, such as the Waitangi Tribunal, Māori Land Court, and Environment Court.  

Dr Hickford was the legal advisor to the Prime Minister in the Prime Minister’s Policy Advisory Group in the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet from 2010 until 2015. He has been on the Board of Directors for the Australia New Zealand School of Government (ANZSOG) and a Board member of Te Kura Kaiwhakawā/Institute of Judicial Studies, and the New Zealand Council of Legal Education. 

As Crown Counsel in the Treaty of Waitangi and natural resources areas from 2002, he advised many public sector agencies across the justice, natural resource and economic sectors, as well as Ministers of the Crown directly. He was engaged on a range of iwi-Māori-Crown relations issues at the interface of state and indigenous laws, and in the context of policy formulation across diverse portfolios, including on the Te Arawa Lakes, Te Urewera and Te Awa Tupua Treaty settlements. Mark was the Chief Legal Adviser and Director of the Legal Services Directorate at the Ministry for Primary Industries from August 2013 until April 2014 (seconded from the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet). Mark was at Chapman Tripp (Auckland office) from 1993 until 1996 and was also based at a public law specialist firm, Chen Palmer & Partners, from 2000 until 2002. He has published extensively including the monograph Lords of the Land: Indigenous Property Rights and the Jurisprudence of Empire (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011).