The peak for Victoria’s 49 community legal centres has launched a guide supporting community legal centres’ law reform and policy work, showing centres how they can advocate effectively to change unfair laws, policies and practices.
‘We’re launching this guide today because we recognise – together with the Productivity Commission – that policy advocacy and law reform are an essential and irreplaceable part of the work of community legal centres. Continue reading
Federal cuts to Indigenous legal services and other legal centres will worsen underservicing of high legal need among Indigenous people around Australia according to a recently completed national research project undertaken by the Cairns Institute of James Cook University. Continue reading
The announcement of Rosie Batty as Australian of the Year has renewed the media focus on family violence, and has highlighted the contradiction between the Federal Government’s stated commitment to tackling family violence and its cuts to frontline services helping women at risk, including many community legal centres. Continue reading
Deep Federal cuts to community legal centres and advocacy restrictions will affect women and children at risk of family violence, and contradict the prime minister’s claimed commitment to ending family violence in his announcement of Rosie Batty as Australian of the Year .
‘There’s no way of “selling” or better communicating the current policies to women at risk of death from family violence. What is needed is a significant policy shift to reverse these cuts and freedom for community legal centres to speak out on the problem and suggest ways it can be stopped,’ said Liana Buchanan, Executive Officer of the Federation of Community Legal Centres, today. Continue reading
