Page 972 - Week 03 - Thursday, 23 March 2017
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The provision of legal services through community legal centres is about ensuring access to justice. Most, if not all, of the services provided by community legal centres are provided free of charge, ensuring that those who suffer disadvantage can receive legal advice and representation in our legal system.
It is clear that these services, by and large, would not be provided by private legal firms. I know that many firms contribute pro bono work through a range of services, but overall there is a significant degree of unmet demand. I make that point in my motion because in 2014 the Productivity Commission looked at this issue in its report on access to justice arrangements. They recommended that funding to community legal centres be increased by $200 million each year from both the state and territory and federal governments.
This goes to my earlier point about both levels of government needing to play a role. There does need to be a discussion about that, but these very significant cuts that have been slated by the federal government to take effect from 1 July this year for existing services will have a very significant impact. The Productivity Commission report highlights the fact that there is growing demand, there is an increasing need. It is not a time to be cutting. It should be a time where we are looking to prioritise this and ensure that there is adequate access to justice for vulnerable members of our community.
Access to the services of community legal centres means more effective outcomes for clients and more efficient operation of our courts. While this ultimately remains the right of the client, we know that self-representation can lead to unintended burdens on our court system as people try to navigate the complex processes and procedures of the courts.
Cutting funding to community legal centres is simply a false economy, for the reasons I have just outlined and, more powerfully, because an independent analysis completed by the National Association of Community Legal Centres found that each dollar provided in supporting community legal centres can deliver as much as $18 in benefits to our community. That report details in quite significant ways where that figure has come from, but in short it is about the fact that there are people who do not end up in the court system, and there are obviously savings attached to that.
There are significant savings for people simply in their own lives in not having to go down the path of being involved in a legal matter. Often there are stories where people—for a range of reasons, as I have touched on, perhaps because they have literacy issues or they have issues because they have English as a second language—get caught up in something that people with stronger skills can deal with more effectively. Having the support of a community legal centre can resolve something much more quickly. That is one of the real benefits of the community legal centres.
These are, in the broad, the reasons I have brought forward this motion today. It is important for us as an Assembly to implore the federal government to reconsider these funding cuts that come into effect from 1 July. It is a funding cliff that will severely
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