New Zealand Liability Conference

Dr Fiona Crichton is a health psychology specialist and behavioural scientist.

Combined with a legal career incorporating roles as a litigation lawyer and a legal writer, Fiona’s work in health psychology has provided her a breadth of knowledge about the factors influencing psychological wellbeing and adaptive behaviour change.

Fiona brings these skills to the table in her work with Groov, as well as a track record of implementing workplace wellbeing programmes that improve wellbeing and performance within workplaces around New Zealand and Australia.

Philippa is widely regarded as one of New Zealand’s leading litigation and dispute resolution lawyers. She has been named a Leading Individual in every Legal 500 Asia Pacific edition since 2017 and is now a member of their Hall of Fame. Philippa is ranked Band 1 for Insurance in Chambers.

Her principal specialist area is the representation of professionals in connection with claims for negligence and disciplinary complaints. The parties she routinely assists include lawyers, chartered accountants, engineers, architects and insurance brokers.

She also regularly acts in claims against directors and officers, including (recently) those brought by liquidators, receivers or regulators arising from corporate financial collapse.

She routinely represents insurers and their clients in property damage claims which are covered under public and products liability policies.

Other areas of specialty include construction disputes (including leaky building litigation) and regulatory prosecutions.

Anna is a claims litigator with extensive experience in property damage, public liability and professional indemnity claims.

Anna’s general liability expertise includes advising insurers on indemnity issues arising out of product recalls and third-party claims, as well as conducting the defence of those claims in a variety of forums. She also has experience defending claims against solicitors, engineers, architects and other professionals facing claims from both the private and public sector.

Anna represented insurers on earthquake related claims in both the commercial and residential spaces following the Canterbury earthquakes.  She has appeared in various appellate and courts of first instance and is experienced in alternative dispute resolution.

Anna previously practiced in the professional and commercial disputes team for a large firm in London, including appearances as instructing solicitor in the Chancery Division.  She was a Fulbright Scholar and holds a masters’ degree from Columbia University in New York.

Nick is an insurance specialist with over 30 years experience in the industry. At General Reinsurance, Nick is the Casualty Manager responsible for the broader range of casualty products.

Nick has a background in property and casualty reinsurance as well as direct insurance. His past executive roles have included marketing, underwriting and claims management.

Nick has spoken regularly at seminars in Australia, New Zealand and Asia. He has also previously held the post of Specialist Lecturer at the University of Technology, Sydney, lecturing the Liability subject within the post-graduate course “Executive Certificate in Insurance".

David is the senior litigation partner at Brookfields Lawyers. He has extensive experience in insurance and construction litigation, as well as criminal and regulatory prosecutions (primarily acting for defendants in recent years).

David acted for ID Tours in the well-publicised prosecution by WorkSafe relating to the Whakaari/White Island eruption in 2019 and successfully had the charge against ID Tours dismissed at the conclusion of the prosecution case.

Prior to joining Brookfields, David was a crown prosecutor in Auckland, prosecuting the full range of criminal and regulatory cases, including multiple jury trials. He also acted in substantial construction arbitrations and negligence claims in Hong Kong.

At Brookfields, David acts for councils and their insurers and large corporates. David has appeared in the High Court, Court of Appeal and Supreme Court as lead counsel in major litigation.

Martin started his insurance career in South Africa. He worked as a property underwriter specialising in mining and petrochemical. He then moved into reinsurance writing both facultative treaty and retrocession accounts.

In 1988 he emigrated to New Zealand and once again was a reinsurance buyer, which he did until 1996 when he moved to Australia to be the Technical and Reinsurance Manager for AMP General and then Allianz Australia.

Moving back to New Zealand in 2004 he held the roles of Technical and Reinsurance Manger of QBE and was one of the founding shareholders of DUAL New Zealand where the held the role of Chief Operating Officer and the Underwriting Director.

Since 2018 Martin has been at NZI and is now the National Manager Liability. During his career Martin has been a speaker at various ANZIIF conferences, Reinsurance Rendezvous in Australia been an expert witness in both mediations and the High Court and appeared as an expert in a number of reinsurance arbitrations.