George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Attorney-General) Share this | Hansard source

Senator Lines, I can confirm to you that a new National Partnership agreement for legal assistance will commence on 1 July.

On 26 March the government announced that as part of the new National Partnership agreement we would be reinstating $25.5 million over the first two years of that program to reinstate cuts that had been announced in the 2013 MYEFO across three programs. That means that 61 community legal centres, which would have been impacted by that savings measure, will have their current Commonwealth funding levels guaranteed over the next two years.

There have been some adjustments across the states and territories, both between the legal assistance commissions and the community legal centres. In some states the amount of funding has increased and in some states it has reduced, because a demand-driven formula has been applied by my department. At the Law, Crime and Community Safety Council meeting in Canberra some weeks ago that formula was not called into question by any state or territory Attorney-General—not one.

The new National Partnership agreement gives certainty to the legal assistance sector over the coming years. It maintains the Commonwealth's very significant commitment to that sector. It means by the way that, although the focus of Commonwealth funding is on Commonwealth cases, there are large areas, particularly Indigenous legal assistance, where the responsibility for funding state matters is entirely borne by the Commonwealth.