Although plaintiff-focused law firms have been a staple of many overseas jurisdictions, they have been scarce in New Zealand. Adina Thorn helped raise the profile of these firms when she set up her class action firm and Cuncannon Law has built a solid practice with class action and consumer complaints law, despite being a recent addition to the law firm fraternity in New Zealand.
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Former Meredith Connell partner Fionnghuala Cuncannon had been looking at setting up a plaintiff-focused firm some time ago, being requested to do so by colleague and Meredith Connell partner Liesle Theron, now her partner at Cuncannon.
The firm has hit the ground running this year with some significant wins and with three partners (the third being Meredith Connell alumni Kate Muirhead) as well as one associate.
Among the distinguishing features of plaintiff law firms is their use of class action funding and litigation funding to launch legal action.
Cuncannon Law has also handled extensive work for the Commerce Commission, representing the Commission regularly in civil and criminal proceedings against energy companies, finance companies, product manufacturers, and telecommunications companies for breaches of the Fair Trading Act.
Notable Cases
The firm’s principals all have extensive class action experience in some of the largest recent class action litigation and the firm has already made its mark with several high-profile cases including the recent class action against the ANZ and ASB banks over interest rate swap mis-selling.
Both banks may have to refund interest to more than 100-thousand customers with home loans in an action regarding a breach of consumer rights contracts. The Court of Appeal has ordered affected customers to be included in the case.
The firm also acted for Intueri shareholders to recover the financial losses they suffered following the company’s collapse in 2017, alleging defects in the IPO and other breaches leading to shareholder losses. A confidential settlement was achieved in September this year.
They also acted for shareholders of CBL to recover losses suffered following the company’s collapse in early 2018. The claim was settled last year with settled funds distributed in September 2023.
Market Impact
The emergence of plaintiff-focused firms like Cuncannon Law represents a shift in New Zealand’s legal market, helped massively by third party funding opportunities whereby plaintiffs can offset the usual litigation costs with decent funding options.
The ability of litigation funding options to open the way for plaintiffs to fight corporates and government entities continues to level the plaintiff playing field.
