Multicultural activities
In 2010-11 we continued our commitment to clients from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. Within these communities we promoted greater awareness of our services and sought to improve their access to justice by:
- responding to community education requests within the multicultural sector
- distributing translated legal information to culturally and linguistically diverse communities
- attending the Queensland Multicultural Festival
- participating in the interdepartmental committee on multicultural affairs convened by Multicultural Affairs Queensland
- supporting the provision of free interpreter services to clients in accordance with the government’s Language Services Policy.
We collaborated with National Legal Aid on a community legal education project to produce a DVD Getting to know the law in your new country to help newly arrived migrants and refugees to understand the Australian legal system.
We have also appointed a Community Legal Education coordinator and developed a Community Legal Education Strategy that will focus on clients from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds as a priority client group.
Improving services for Indigenous clients
We are committed to providing services to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Our CEO meets regularly with the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Service (ATSILS) to discuss strategies and issues affecting service delivery to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
Strategies undertaken by Legal Aid Queensland included:
- providing funding to support ATSILS to provide duty lawyer services in Cape York Peninsula and Gulf of Carpentaria communities
- funding disbursements such as counsel for ATSILS in criminal law and other matters
- promoting our Indigenous Information Hotline, which gives priority to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander callers so they can access legal information and advice for the cost of a local call from anywhere in Queensland
- providing outreach services in Aurukun, Bamaga, Bowen, Cooktown, Hopevale, Ingham, Injinoo, Mapoon, Napranum, New Mapoon, Palm Island, Ravenshoe, Seisia, Thursday Island, Tully, Umagico, Weipa and Wujal Wujal to help ensure Indigenous clients in these areas can access free face-to-face legal advice
- representing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander clients who enter the Queensland Indigenous Alcohol Diversion Program — a voluntary treatment program for Indigenous people appearing in the magistrates court for alcohol related offences or the childrens court for child protection matters where alcohol misuse has contributed to the situation
- coordinating regional legal assistance forums, which include ATSILS representatives
- hosting a ‘Member Benefit’ seminar with the Queensland Law Society and ATSILS on communication skills and cultural considerations when representing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander clients
- maintaining best practice guidelines for in-house and private lawyers performing legal aid work to ensure legal services are provided to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander clients in a culturally appropriate way
- publishing legal information brochures, factsheets, wallet cards and posters that specifically target Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
Mental illness and intellectual disability in the criminal justice system
In the recent case of R v AAM; ex parte A-G (Queensland), the Court of Appeal set aside the convictions of a defendant who had a significant intellectual impairment and had pleaded guilty in the magistrates court on the basis that she was unfit to plead and did not enter the pleas in the exercise of a free choice.
The Court of Appeal identified the absence of a legislative framework for dealing with people with a mental illness or intellectual or cognitive disability charged with simple offences whose disability was so significant that they were unfit to plead or be tried.
This case highlights the difficulties the justice system has in dealing with people charged with simple offences who have an intellectual or cognitive disability of such severity that they are unfit to plead guilty or be tried or cannot be held criminally responsible for their actions.
No data is available for the number of people with an intellectual disability or cognitive impairment appearing before Queensland courts but a New South Wales study found that 23 percent of people appearing before magistrates had an intellectual disability and a further 14 percent were on the borderline of having an intellectual disability. It is also estimated that the proportion of people with mental illness in the criminal justice system is significantly higher than the proportion in the general community. To begin to address this problem, we have recently included a question about disability on our duty lawyer forms.
Where a lawyer has a real and substantial doubt about a client’s fitness to plead, the lawyer should not conduct a plea of guilty for the client. However, not all people with an intellectual or cognitive impairment or a mental illness are necessarily unfit to plead or be tried or have a defence of unsoundness of mind.
It is important to respect the right of a person with an intellectual or cognitive disability to take responsibility for themselves and be treated as a person in court, rather than a patient under care.
Following this case, Legal Aid Queensland conducted a continuing professional development intensive seminar for our duty lawyers on representing clients who have a mental illness or intellectual impairment in the magistrates court. We will continue to conduct professional development seminars on disability and mental health issues to ensure duty lawyers understand and fulfil their professional responsibilities when acting for clients with a mental illness or intellectual or cognitive disability. Our Law Week Hypothetical also examined the issues faced by people with an intellectual disability in the criminal justice system.
We are also revising our Duty Lawyer Handbook, and developing guidelines for appropriately dealing with clients who are, or may be, mentally ill or who have an intellectual or cognitive disability for incorporation into our case management standards for criminal law matters. We are working with government agencies to develop a more effective response to people with mental illness or intellectual impairment, who are charged with simple offences.
Women as a priority client group
Legal Aid Queensland treats women, especially women experiencing domestic violence as a priority client group. We support the Queensland Government strategy to reduce domestic and family violence by delivering legal information, advice and representation to disadvantaged Queenslanders experiencing domestic and family violence.
We have two specialist legal units dealing with domestic violence — Women’s Legal Aid and the Domestic Violence Unit. Women’s Legal Aid is a group of specialist female lawyers and social workers that provide services to women and policy advice on domestic violence issues.
Their mission is to increase access to improve the responsiveness of Legal Aid Queensland to meet women’s needs. They work to develop and maintain effective working relationships with service providers and identify, review and respond to issues impacting on women’s access to justice.
The unit acts for women with complex legal matters in the areas of family law, child protection, discrimination and crime. They also provide services to women from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds and women with intellectual disabilities.
Our Domestic Violence Unit specialises in delivering domestic violence services to some of our most vulnerable clients. We also have a network of family lawyers in our 13 regional offices across the state that deliver domestic violence services to their local communities.
In 2010-11, 74% of the grants of aid for legal representation in domestic violence matters were issued to women.
Legal Aid Queensland’s Violence Against Women Strategy is an integrated, collaborative and consistent response to clients who have been affected by domestic violence. Under the strategy we have developed and implemented a number of practical tools for our practitioners including:
- Best Practice Guidelines for Working with Clients Affected by Domestic Violence
- Best Practice Guidelines for Working with Sexual Assault Victims
- a domestic violence risk assessment tool
- an internal policy for responding to staff experiencing domestic violence.
Figure 17: Applications for grants of aid received by location
Figure 18: Legal advices provided by location
Legal services for regional, rural and remote Queenslanders
Legal Aid Queensland supports legal services to rural, regional and remote areas of Queensland. Legal Aid Queensland has 13 regional offices with 111 staff providing services to regional Queensland, and a state-wide network of 318 regional preferred supplier private law firms.
66% of all grants of aid issued in 2010-11 were to regional Queenslanders, and 86% of those grants were to private practitioners in regional areas who do legal aid work.
We provide direct legal services such as grants of aid, legal advices and duty lawyer services to people in rural, regional and remote Queensland. Other services offered by Legal Aid that are available to regional Queenslanders include:
- legal outreach clinics from Legal Aid offices at Caboolture, Cairns, Toowoomba and Townsville where lawyers travel to surrounding regions or link in by video to provide legal advice services
- a free state-wide telephone legal help line and an Indigenous Hotline that people can call from anywhere in Queensland for the cost of a local call
- access for preferred supplier law firms to Legal Aid Queensland’s Continuing Professional Development program and library resources
- thirty-four community access points across Queensland providing a range of community support services, information about Legal Aid Queensland’s services, a sample of our publications and assistance to access free telephone legal advice
- supporting the Western Queensland Justice Network to provide free legal services to people living in regional Queensland
- coordinating the work of 12 Regional Legal Assistance Forums across the state, which help to identify emerging legal issues in their communities
- providing Family Court Duty Lawyer Services in Brisbane, Townsville, Cairns, Mackay, Bundaberg, Rockhampton, Maroochydore, Toowoomba, Southport, Hervey Bay and Ipswich
- providing criminal law duty lawyer services in regional towns across Queensland
- In-house counsel appearing in regional courts circuits including Mount Isa, the Gulf of Carpentaria, Thursday Island and Cape York Peninsula.
Access and equity
|
|
Crime |
Family |
Civil |
Overall |
|
Legal Advice |
|
Women |
25% |
66% |
52% |
49% |
|
Indigenous |
6% |
5% |
5% |
5% |
|
Rural and Remote |
5% |
7% |
8% |
6% |
|
NESB |
9% |
10% |
12% |
10% |
|
Applications Received |
|
Women |
20% |
59% |
58% |
40% |
|
Indigenous |
14% |
7% |
9% |
11% |
|
Rural and Remote |
9% |
7% |
6% |
8% |
|
NESB |
6% |
7% |
9% |
7% |
|
Applications Approved |
|
Women |
19% |
56% |
60% |
37% |
|
Indigenous |
15% |
8% |
10% |
12% |
|
Rural and Remote |
9% |
7% |
6% |
8% |
|
NESB |
5% |
6% |
7% |
6% |
Table 4: Advice and grants of aid for identified disadvantaged groups.