Trusts Act 2019: Act and Analysis

Author:  Professor Emerita Nicola Peart ONZM

The Trusts Act 2019 (the Act) came into force in January 2021, replacing the 1956 legislation with what was intended to restate much of the existing law in plain language, reform some of the law and make trusts law more accessible to all those who use trusts in New Zealand.  In the years since, the courts have started to develop a corpus of case law on the new Act, construing and applying new law and drawing on well-established equitable principles to give meaning to restatements of the law.

The Trusts Act 2019: Act and Analysis contains the full text of the Act with section-based commentary, along with an extensive introduction.  While the Trusts Act will become the primary source of trust law for New Zealand, the Act is not intended to be a code and does not deal with some aspects of trust law, such as constructive and resulting trusts, and remedies for breach of trust.  The introduction to the book provides an overview of areas not covered by the Act.  The section-based commentary analyses and applies case law to the legislation as at January 2024, providing users with an orderly, practical reflection of the Trusts Act 2019, its principles, and how they are applied by the courts. 

This book has been published to meet the needs of both the student and practitioner markets, as a guide and a research tool for trusts law in New Zealand.  The content is drawn from Family Law - Family Property (online looseleaf edition, Thomson Reuters), which is updated four times a year.

This book is very timely. Written in clear and concise language, it will be a “must have” for trust and property practitioners, litigators and judges alike ... I congratulate Nicola on an outstanding work and welcome its addition to the literature on the law of trusts in New Zealand.

Hon Justice Helen Cull, High Court of New Zealand, Foreword to Trusts Act 2019: Act and Analysis