Travel and Learning Award for Hon Justice Matthew Palmer

Supporting Justice Matthew Palmer to Travel to Oxford and Paris to research and write an article about the reasonable use of unreasonableness at Magdalen College and the Bonavero Human Rights institute at Oxford University.

Borrin Foundation Travel and Learning Award

Justice Palmer’s plan

The Hon Justice Matthew Palmer will travel to the United Kingdom to take up a Robert S Campbell Visiting Fellowship at Magdalen College, Oxford.  While there, from April to June 2023, he will research “the reasonable use of unreasonableness” as a ground of judicial review.  He will travel to other universities in the United Kingdom, and to an international Administrative Law Discussion Forum in Paris, to present and receive feedback on aspects of his research.

About Justice Palmer

Hon Justice Matthew Palmer graduated BA (Economics and Political Science) (1983) from the University of Canterbury, LLB (Hons 1st class) (1987) from Victoria University of Wellington,and  LLM Master of Laws (1990) and JSD Doctor of Laws (1994) from Yale Law School.  He was admitted to the New Zealand Bar in 1987 and appointed Queen’s Counsel in 2014.  He has held positions as manager in the Treasury, Deputy Secretary for Justice, Pro Vice Chancellor and Dean of Law at Victoria University of Wellington and Director of the NZ Centre for Public law, and Deputy Solicitor-General (Public Law). At the bar he was at Thorndon Chambers, Wellington.  Justice Palmer was the New Zealand Law Foundation 2005 International Research Fellow while Herbert Smith Visitor at the University of Cambridge Faculty of Law and Fulbright Senior Scholar at Yale Law School.  He has taught law in the United States, Hong Kong and Singapore.  He was appointed to the High Court of New Zealand in 2015 and has been based in Auckland and now Wellington.

Grant Amount

$8,120 in 2023 to support travel

“I knew Ian Borrin, who established the Foundation.  He was a caring and compassionate man, deeply invested in the pursuit of justice.  I am honoured to benefit from his generosity.”

– Justice Matthew Palmer