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LAWENVIR 736 2013
Special Topic: Comparative Water Law and Policy
Lecturer Bio
Janice Gray lectures in
Property, Equity, Trusts,
and Water Law in the
Faculty of Law, University
of New South Wales,
Sydney. She has
published both nationally
and internationally in
these fields. Her coauthored
book, Water
Resources Law was published by LexisNexis in
2009 and the third edition of her book J Gray (et
al), Property Law in New South Wales was
published in 2012. In 2009, Ms Gray was a
Visiting Scholar (elected) at Wolfson College,
University of Oxford, England and a Visiting
Scholar (selected) at the Centre for Socio Legal
Studies, University of Oxford, England. In 2012,
she was an Invited Researcher/ Visiting Scholar at
Lameta, INRA, SupAgro (Grande Ecole),
Montpellier, France where she continued her
water law research. Prior to this Ms Gray has
been a Visiting Professor at the Universities of
Toronto (Osgoode Hall), Ottawa and
Saskatchewan, in Canada and the Universidade
Pontificia Catolica do Rio Janeiro, in Brazil.
Ms Gray was a partner collaborator on the Urine
Diverting Toilets Project which won a 2012 Green
Globe Award for innovation. She is the Editor-in-
Chief of the Australasian Journal of Natural
Resources Law and Policy; on the Editorial Board
of the Canadian Journal of Native Studies; and an
editor of the Human Rights Defender. She holds a
current practising certificate as a lawyer in the
state of New South Wales and has been a
member of the Property Law Committee of the
NSW Law Society. Prior to becoming an academic
she worked as a solicitor in a large, commercial
firm. Her research has been cited by the High
Court of Australia.
Course Outline
Water is a finite resource that needs to be
managed carefully to ensure the survival of
human life, the health of the environment and
economic stability. This course uses New Zealand
water law as the springboard for analysis of
contemporary water law and policy issues in
comparative jurisdictions. Issues examined
include: water as a commons; the legal nature of
water rights, water trading; water governance
frameworks, institutional arrangements; and the
human right to water.
Syllabus
Terrestrial water resources are examined through
a study of:
The role of water in our world;
The global commons concept;
English common law principles- eg
riparianism (cf prior appropriation);
The role of and intersection with
Indigenous/First Nations/Maori law and
traditions;
Legislative water regimes, including their
objectives and tools;
Institutional frameworks for water
management, including the classification
of water resources and constitutional
issues;
The nature of water access rights- what is
their legal genealogy?
Water allocation planning and its
incorporation into legislative regimes;
The administration of water
entitlements- on what basis are they
granted? What is their content? How are
they varied?
Water trading as a system of water
sharing.
Urban water management eg- customer
contracts and pricing;
Water as a human right.

Accordingly the course deals with private law
concepts (eg property) and public law concepts
(eg constitutional and human rights law). It also
considers the blurring of the divide between
public and private law in relation to water and
examines the effectiveness of participatory
decision-making and multi-layered governance.
As a result the course is a hybrid and covers
aspects of:
Environmental /Natural Resources Law;
Competition/Commercial Law;
Property Law; and
Human Rights Law.
Objectives
The chief objective of the course is to provide
students with an introduction to a range of
contemporary issues that are relevant to water
law and policy in a world where water resources
are under increasing pressure.
The course uses New Zealand water law as a
launching pad for discussion and analysis of
comparative, water law and policy issues in other
jurisdictions.
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course students should be
able to:
Appreciate the importance of water as a
subject for regulation and governance;
Understand the key (historical) principles
of English law on which many other
jurisdictions based their water law;
Understand the key legal principles
governing the management of water
resources in New Zealand;
Recognise and understand the main
principles of selected comparative
domestic water law regimes.
Understand the intersection of human
rights law with water governance. ;
Identify and use the key legal and policy
materials applied in the jurisdictions.
studied; and .
Comment critically on the law and policy
relevant to specific water problems.
Assessment
90% research essay of 12,500 words and 10%
class participation/presentation.
Essay
Each student is required to submit a research
essay of no more than 12,500 words including an
abstract/synopsis of 500 words. The essay is to
be original work, relying on secondary and
primary sources. It MUST be the work of the
student. Another person other than the enrolled
student MUST NOT write the essay nor do the
research on behalf of the enrolled student.
Further, plagiarism is not permitted and in that
regard each student should read the University’s
plagiarism policy and adhere to it. All students
will be expected to sign a plagiarism declaration
when submitting their essays. Students must also
use proper legal citations and include a reading
list at the end of their type-written essay. The
essay should be comprised of properly crafted
English sentences. (Note form is unacceptable.)
The use of sub-headings is encouraged and
footnotes rather than Harvard style in-text
referencing are to be used.
Descriptive essays are not encouraged. Instead
students are expected to engage with relevant
legal issues by: critiquing the law; developing
proposals for reform; examining the operation of
law and policy in practice; and/or providing a
conceptual analysis of the law, for example.
Essays must be submitted to the Faculty of Law,
by 4.00 pm Thursday 9 May, 2013.
Extensions will not be granted lightly (only on
sickness and compassionate grounds) and must
be requested formally through the Postgraduate
Manager.
Class Participation/Presentation.
Each student will be asked to prepare a brief (15
minute) answer to one of the focus questions in
the Learning Guide and present this to the rest of
the class. In addition, each student is expected to
make individual contributions to seminar
discussions. Students will be individually assessed
on the quality of their contributions.

Criteria & Marking:
Students will be individually assessed on the
quality of their contributions with reference to
the following criteria:
the extent to which the student has
identified the important and relevant
issues;
the clarity of argument;
the depth and thoroughness of
understanding of the seminar material;,
the strength and clarity of the arguments
presented;
the overall lucidity of the contribution;
the extent to which issues are placed in
their wider context;
the extent to which the student has
displayed a grasp of the doctrinal and
normative issues;
the analysis and synthesis of material
and;
the ability to draw worthwhile
conclusions.
Class participation will assessed over the whole 5
days of the course. Quality rather than quantity
will be assessed but clearly if a student is not
present for all the classes it will be impossible to
achieve the maximum marks possible even if a
student’s contributions are brilliant when he/she
does speak. Students are reminded that the full
range of marks is available to the lecturer in
assessing class participation. Please be assured
that the lecturer is very aware that mistakes are
part of learning. Accordingly, ‘getting the law
right’ is not the key focus of the class
participation component of assessment. If
students knew all the law from the outset, there
would be little point in them enrolling in the
course. Rather, class participation is included to
extend students and to assess students’
imaginative understanding of, and engagement
with, the materials under discussion. It is not
meant to be threatening.
Teaching Method
The course will be taught over five days
commencing on a Wednesday and concluding at
the end of the following Tuesday. Classes will be
interactive and hopefully very friendly. It will,
however, be necessary for students to do the
pre-reading for the course so that they get the
most out of the materials under discussion.
Classes will commence at 9am and run till
4.30pm. Morning tea will be around 10.30am
(approx. 20 minutes). We will also have a short
break in the afternoon. On the last day of the
course, the Faculty of Law, will provide a light
lunch.
Course Details
Semester One
Study mode Intensive
Dates 20-26 February 2013
Time 9.00am - 4.30pm
Location Room 340, 1-11 Short Street
Value 30 Points
Contact Details
Postgraduate Law Centre
Level 7, 1-11 Short St
s.pilkington@auckland.ac.nz
Lecturer contact details: j.gray@unsw.edu.au
Reading Materials
Reading materials will be contained in the
Casebook/Study Guide. Students may also be
asked to access additional materials via the
internet.