New Zealand Council of Legal Studies (NZCLE)

[ashishkb]

Hello Everyone

I am planning to apply for residence under the Skilled Migrant Category. I want to claim point for my missus qualification. She graduated in LLB Hons in UK. Having had a look at the immigration website of NZ, it seems that I will have to apply for an assessment of her LLB (by NZCLE) in the same way I did for my degree (NZQA). I wanted to know if anyone on this forum have had to apply for an overseas qualification to be assess by the NZCLE and what is time-frame expected?

Note that she is not a barrister/sollicitor. She only graduated in LLB Hons and is currently working as a compliance officer. I had a look at the instruction document (http://www.nzcle.org.nz/Docs/Admission_Brochure.pdf) but I am unclear whether she will need to sit for exams or not. I would be grateful if anyone of you who had to go through the NZCLE procedure advise briefly on the following:
1. timeframe for assessment to be completed
2. documents you sent in the case where you only want to assess your LLB and applying to practise law in NZ
3. Any other useful information.

Thanks and Best Regards
Ashish

[JandM]

Your wife's qualifications only need to be recognized, either because they are on the INZ list of exempt qualifications, or by sending them to NZQA. See here. http://www.immigration.govt.nz/opsmanual/42640.htm NZCLE would only have to be involved if she wanted to practise as a lawyer.

[ashishkb]

Thanks for the clarification JandM

[NJ2NZ]

If you'd still like to know about NZCLE, you can request their current info pack and this'll give you an idea about the 6 exams (NZLPE) that foreign lawyers generally must pass. Depending on where their legal education was obtained, length of practice and type of jurisdiction (common v civil), NZCLE may exempt a candidate from taking one or more exams an/or add requirements for doing legal course(s) at a NZ law school, and also do a post NZLPE course known as profs (about 18 weeks full time, I think). NZLPE exams are held twice a year, and may be sat in the UK. There's no requirement that all of them have to be taken at once.

Everything that remotely concerns law is very expensive here. That includes the assessment (I believe upwards of NZD 1,500), exams (each about NZD 500), profs (don't know the exact fees as I've been fortunately exempted) - etc.