www.nzcle.org.nz

New Zealand Council of Legal Education

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Christmas Closedown

The Council will be closed on Friday 19 December 2025 and will reopen on Monday 12 January 2026.

Please note the following:

Stale Qualifications applications will stop processing applications from 19 December 2025. Any applications currently in progress at 19 December will be placed on hold until we return on 12 January 2026. Any Stale Applications received after 19 December will be processed once we return on 12 January 2026.

Please note, although the standard application time takes forty (40) business days, the period between 19 December and 12 January will not be recognised as business days.

Stale Qualifications

In any case where a ‘qualification for admission’ is more than 10 years old at the time that a candidate for admission applies to the NZCLE for a Certificate of Completion, the NZCLE may, in its discretion, assess such qualification, and may impose further study or training on the candidate.

For New Zealand LLB degree holders, a ‘qualification for admission’ means a New Zealand LLB (or LLB with Hons), any subject of examination (i.e. core subjects), a university course in Legal Ethics, the Professional Legal Studies Course.

For overseas graduates or lawyers, a ‘qualification for admission’ means in respect of any determination issued to such person in relation to an application for assessment, any degree subject, the New Zealand Law and Practice Examination, legal ethics course, practical legal training course or English requirement prescribed by NZCLE pursuant to that determination.

If any of the following LLB core subjects were completed before 2015, you must make a stale application:

• The Legal System
• Legal Ethics
• Public Law
• Contracts
• Torts
• Criminal Law
• Property law (or Land Law and Equity and Succession)
  

Note: For those with stale qualifications as above and who are applying for a Certificate of Completion after 1 January 2027, in addition to any other study or training which might be imposed on assessment of stale qualifications, such applicants will be required to take and pass a university degree course in tikanga Māori: Māori Laws and Philosophy, which became a LLB core subject from 1 January 2025.

Please click here for more information and a staleness assessment application form.