Stuff Digital Edition

A life of law, courage and the truth

When Judge Neil MacLean became New Zealand’s first chief coroner in 2007, his greatest priority was creating a legal process that would support the families of the deceased so they could start the hard process of moving forward.

Perhaps that should come as no surprise, because behind the judge’s robes and gavel, Allan Neil MacLean was a family man who hugged his children extra tight at night on the days he led inquiries into a child’s death.

MacLean died from ill health on November 17 at the age of 77.

A memorial service was held one week later at St Peter’s Cathedral in Hamilton on what would have been his 78th birthday.

The son of a judge, MacLean grew up in Christchurch and went to Christchurch Boys’ High School.

After school, he followed in his father’s footsteps by graduating from the University of Canterbury with a Bachelor of Laws in 1967. Conscripted by ballot into the army, MacLean completed his stint as part of the armed forces before joining his father’s legal firm.

The legal practice was not only the place he found his feet as a young lawyer, but also where he met his wife, Sue, in 1966 when she had just started as a new clerk and he was called in to show her the ropes. The couple married in 1969 and spent the next 53 years of their lives together.

In 1971, the MacLeans welcomed their first child, Cate, followed by Hamish in 1974. Thanks to what Sue jokingly refers to as ‘‘a beautiful glitch in the system’’, their youngest, Laura, was born in 1988.

Grandchildren Eli, Alex, Bella, Sam, Archie and Eliott followed in the years after.

A life of law

MacLean laid the foundation of his illustrious legal career in Christchurch, where he was a partner in three law practices between 1972 and 1993.

During this time, he started doing coronial work, learning everything there was to know about a coroner’s role.

After being offered a position as a district court judge, MacLean and his wife moved to Gisborne in 1994, where he was the sole judge in the East Coast town. He worked his coronial role around his job on the bench and enjoyed it more than the grind of the criminal court.

In 2007, MacLean’s name became wellknown beyond the parameters of the justice system after he was appointed as New Zealand’s first chief coroner.

It was essentially his job to overhaul the coronial system and MacLean established a radically different system where coroners were available 24 hours a day, families were involved in hearings, and important decisions could be made within hours.

Close friends described MacLean as having ‘‘a quiet, steely determination, which enabled him to withstand resistance and doubt’’ to the decisions he made.

‘‘At all times Neil shouldered scrutiny, and responded to the expectations of the public with gentle authority. His calm but determined leadership often required courage – Neil had that courage.’’

MacLean was passionate and committed to the chief coroner role from day one, Sue said. ‘‘He would not expect his coroners to do what he wouldn’t do himself, so the week he started, the first coroner on duty was Neil.’’

He was ‘‘openly and utterly apolitical’’, had excellent people skills, and always spoke the truth. ‘‘It wasn’t about politics, it was about doing the job.’’

While the couple opted to stay in Hamilton, MacLean initially worked from Wellington before making Auckland his base. ‘‘We lived out of a suitcase for, well, actually 10 years in the end,’’ Sue said.

During his time as chief coroner, MacLean presided over inquiries into two of New Zealand’s biggest mass casualty events: the Pike River mine disaster and the Christchurch earthquakes.

Although these events undoubtedly took an emotional toll on everyone involved, MacLean kept his focus on the legal process.

‘‘For Neil, the coronial process was a legal process to release the families, to give them the freedom to breathe and to grieve,’’ Sue said. ‘‘Of course, he felt desperately sorry for those affected, but for him it was about listening to the voices of the whā nau and helping them move forward.

‘‘It was so important to him to ensure that the families were respected and not lost during that process.’’

MacLean’s insistence on always speaking the truth was mirrored in the way he was a strong advocate for improved reporting and more open discussions on suicide. He began putting out the annual suicide statistics each year, despite the reporting of suicide remaining controversial.

His interest led to him touring New Zealand with mental health advocate Mike King, and in an interview with Stuff in 2015 he said he was astonished by the stories people shared with him. ‘‘What it comes down to is this: The sky is not going to fall in simply because we are going to talk about it,’’ he said.

A loving father and ‘cheeky bugger’

Away from the eyes of the public, MacLean also put his heart and soul into being a loving father and husband.

His children agree that growing up, they never realised what an immensely important role their father played in New Zealand’s judicial system as he always tried to keep his home life separate from his work.

Laura remembered going off to university in Wellington the same year her father was due to start in his role as chief coroner. ‘‘He sat me down and asked if I would mind that he might need to work from Wellington quite a bit, and whether I would feel like he was following me down there. I said ‘no, it is actually quite nice’.’’

He never pressured his children to follow a legal career, instead encouraging them to pursue their own dreams. ‘‘As long as whatever they did, they did to the best of their abilities,’’ Sue said.

MacLean loved golf, listened to an eclectic range of music and was an avid gardener. He adored the written word in any form and left behind a house filled with thousands of books.

‘‘He was a consumer of information, so you could never buy him a book because chances were he had already read it,’’ Cate said. ‘‘If you travelled anywhere, you always had to bring the local newspaper with you even though he had it loaded on his iPad.’’

MacLean was sombre and serious, but ‘‘a bit of a cheeky bugger as well’’, Cate said. ‘‘He could tell you anything and he would do it so convincingly and in such an eloquent way that you would start to question yourself, even though what he was saying wasn’t quite true.

‘‘He even tried to convince the nurses in hospital at one point that he was a retired concert pianist from Du¨ sseldorf.’’

In 2012, MacLean was awarded an honorary doctorate in law from the University of Canterbury. In 2015, he was made a Companion of the Queen’s Service Order in the Queen’s Birthday Honours for his services to the judiciary.

After he retired as chief coroner in 2015, he spent the next three years as a judge for the Accident Compensation Appeals Authority. After that he continued to serve on the Parole Board, before officially retiring in October 2021.

It was hard to fully step away from the justice system after serving it so diligently for so long. ‘‘It was awful for him, I can tell you that,’’ Sue said. ‘‘It was very hard for him to leave it behind, but at the same time, he was always just doing the job.

‘‘He was not sitting around thinking, ‘I’m going to make a big name for myself.’ He was incredibly humble.’’

Because his mind was so active right up until his death, retirement did not come easy. ‘‘He liked to contribute, he liked to put his mind to things, and so it was hard for him to imagine a world where he couldn’t do that,’’ Cate said.

‘‘He loved what he did, he loved the law and what it stood for, and he appreciated the importance of the role that he played. It gave him great joy and satisfaction.’’

Obituaries

en-nz

2022-12-03T08:00:00.0000000Z

2022-12-03T08:00:00.0000000Z

https://fairfaxmedia.pressreader.com/article/281689733836636

Stuff Limited