Nita Green (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on this urgency motion in regard to legal assistance services and the report by Dr Warren Mundy, an independent review of the NLAP. As most people in this chamber know, I have had a very constant and personal connection to the work that this government is doing on the prevention of family violence. I think everyone in this chamber knows how important and imperative it is for us to take action on family violence and to commit to funding the services that require support, taking preventive action and making sure that we never forget that, at the end of the day, this relates to families, particularly women who face the extreme consequences of deciding whether to stay in a violent situation or to leave that violent situation.

I want to thank very deeply and sincerely the people who work for these legal services. I know that many of them, in North Queensland particularly, do an incredible job. I really am thankful that they provide not just expertise but also care and advocacy. It's that advocacy that has led to our government providing extended and increased funding for this sector. We continue to work with the sector while the 2025 NLAP is being prepared.

The Albanese government recognises the pressure that legal assistance services are under and the importance of strengthening the sector. Legal assistance is essential to ensuring access to justice and equality before the law. Dr Mundy's report is important. We respect the findings. We know that there have been so many reviews, so many inquiries. Unfortunately, under the last government we saw very little investment in the legal services sector. We had community legal services, in particular, here many times, before many budgets, asking for assistance—assistance that never came.

Unlike the Liberals when they were in charge, this government is listening to the legal assistance sector. After a decade of neglect, the Attorney-General is working incredibly hard to ensure that we can invest more money in the sector. We have invested $270 million more in legal assistance funding since the October 2022 budget. That funding is incredibly important for legal assistance services. I acknowledge the very sincere way in which Senator Thorpe moved this motion, but it's not true to say that the government is not providing additional funding to legal assistance. We have done so since the October 2022 budget.

We also announced in this budget, very importantly, $44.1 million of urgent funding to assist legal assistance providers to address current resource and workforce issues until the new NLAP commences on 1 July 2025. This was an important injection of urgent funding, exactly what the sector needs at this time to ensure that there isn't a gap before the new NLAP commences. We'll continue to work with the sector and the states and territories towards a better agreement than those opposite delivered. We know that it's important that we work with the states and territories on how we can combat family violence and how we can provide the legal services assistance that is so desperately needed.

Just on the partnership, while I have a short amount of time left, it was really important that there was a review. It is really important that we get the funding agreement right. That is what our government is working incredibly hard to do. We are taking the findings of the report into consideration, and we'll make sure that we respond to the themes that it covered, including increased investment in access to justice and sustainable sector reform and funding arrangements to ensure that we can have sustainable services into the future. (Time expired)