Community Partnerships

Clayton Utz solicitors attend a number of external legal clinics across Australia, including in:

• Melbourne at the offices of The Big Issue and at Credo Café as part of the Homeless Persons' Legal Clinic;
• Brisbane at Pindari Hostel as part of the Homeless Persons' Legal Clinic;
• Sydney at Our Place;
• Canberra at the Youth Law Centre ACT;
• Brisbane as part of QPILCH's Self-Represented Civil Law Service;
• Brisbane as part of Caxton Legal Centre's Consumer Law Advice Clinic; and
• Alexandra, Yarra Glen, Flowerdale in regional Victoria, as part of Bushfires Legal Help clinics.

We have provided secondments to:

• Kimberley Community Legal Services in Kununurra;
• Geraldton Resource Centre in Geraldton;
• Taylor Street Community Legal Service in Hervey Bay;
• the Public Interest Law Clearing House in Melbourne;
• the Human Rights Law Resource Centre in Melbourne;
• the Youth Law Centre ACT;
• the ACT Pro Bono Clearing House;
• the Disability Discrimination Legal Centre in Sydney;
• the Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Legal Service (Qld Sth) Ltd in Brisbane; and
• World Vision Australia's General Counsel.

Through the Clayton Utz Foundation Fellowship, we have funded lawyers as Clayton Utz Fellows at regional community legal centres, for two years at a time, at:

• Loddon Campaspe Community Legal Centre in Bendigo from 2007 to 2009;
• Hawkesbury-Nepean Community Legal Centre in Windsor from 2008 to 2010; and
• Loddon Campaspe Community Legal Centre, to support the initiation and provision of pilot community legal services in the Goulburn Valley from 2009 to 2011.

Our Pro Bono practice is focussed on disadvantage - acting for people who are disadvantaged and for more than 250 community groups and charities which support them. The full list of our pro bono community partners is included in the 2008 Community Connect Report.

Below are a few current examples of our Pro bono community partnerships.

Our Place Support Centre

Our Place, in inner-city Enmore, is a support centre which provides meals, counselling, welfare, advocacy, referral, outreach services and companionship to some of Sydney's most disadvantaged and marginalised citizens - many of whom are homeless, suffer from serious addictions, mental illness, abusive family environments or are simply lonely and down on their luck.

Since opening its doors in October 2006, Our Place is now visited by up to 250 people a week. In August 2007 we opened a weekly legal clinic at Our Place, which is staffed each Tuesday by Clayton Utz lawyers.

Our Place is working to reduce some of the problems which can come with poverty, including marginalisation, victimisation and physical abuse. Our Place is run entirely by volunteers and receives no government funding. The support centre provides a free breakfast and lunch, daily newspapers, television, radio, and space to rest, read or play games. Most importantly, it provides a sense of community.

Clayton Utz lawyers have been made to feel instantly a part of that community too. On our first visit we received a card (handmade by Our Place clients) welcoming us to Our Place. Ever since, the reception for our lawyers and volunteers has been just as warm.

Kimberley Community Legal Services

KCLS in Kununurra provides legal services to clients across the entire Kimberley region, including many remote Aboriginal communities. Around 95 percent of KCLS' clients are Indigenous. KCLS provides legal assistance in areas such as Criminal Injuries Compensation Claims, Violence Restraining Orders, employment law matters, family law matters, moral claims on deceased estates, law reform work and Community Legal Education presentations.

Much of the work performed involves outreach services to remote communities including Kalumburu, Warmun, Fitzroy Crossing and Oombulgurri.

For many people living in remote communities across the Kimberley, KCLS is the only means by which they can access legal advice. We have seconded lawyers to KCLS since 2005, doubling the number of lawyers at the Centre. Clayton Utz secondees have enabled KCLS to increase its services to disadvantaged remote communities and take on a greater caseload.

"Following my recent visit to Kununurra to open a new Legal Aid office, I would like to acknowledge the positive contribution Clayton Utz makes to the East Kimberley region through the provision of a regular secondment to Kimberley Community Legal Services. Clayton Utz provides a range of valuable pro bono services across Australia. Having now visited Kununurra, it is clear this assistance provided to Kimberley Community Legal Services is invaluable and makes a real difference to improving access to justice." Letter from Robert McClelland, Commonwealth Attorney-General

Clayton Utz / Legal Aid WA Regional Pro Bono Outreach Program

Clayton Utz and Legal Aid WA are working together to improve access to pro bono legal services in regional WA.  Under the Outreach Program, our lawyers accompany Legal Aid's lawyers on circuit for up to a week, to provide advice to clients on a range of matters including employment law, contractual disputes, tenancy disputes, and to also assist the Legal Aid duty lawyer with matters before the Magistrates Court. 

Regions visited under the Outreach Program include the East Kimberley and the Pilbara.

Sexual Assault Communications Privilege

Clayton Utz in Sydney is working with the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, Women's Legal Services, the NSW Bar Association and law firms Blakes and Freehills, to provide victims of sexual assault with free legal representation to enforce their Sexual Assault Communications Privilege in sexual assault criminal prosecutions.

The Criminal Procedure Act gives victims of sexual assault some qualified privilege protection against their discussions with counsellors being obtained under subpoena by Defendants in criminal proceedings. The policy behind Sexual Assault Communications Privilege (SACP), is to protect the confidentiality of sexual assault counselling, so as to encourage sexual assault victims to seek counselling, and to make victims feel more confident about actually reporting sexual assaults.

The difficulty in practice is that the privilege is often not available because a victim has no capacity to appear and argue for it. This unique collaboration between pro bono lawyers, the DPP and the community legal sector provides legal representation in matters before the Downing Centre District Court, and will hopefully lead to much-needed law reform in relation to victims' rights.