National Pro Bono Resource Centre : National Access to Justice and Pro Bono Conference 2006

The National Access to Justice and Pro Bono Conference 2006 was held in Melbourne on Friday 11 and Saturday 12 August 2006. It was hosted by the Law Council of Australia, the Australian Legal Assistance Forum and the National Pro Bono Resource Centre.

The conference follows on from the successful 2nd National Pro Bono Conference held in Sydney in October 2003 and the Legal Aid Congress held in Brisbane in November 2004. The vision is to inaugurate the event in Melbourne and look at it becoming the premier legal gathering concerned with access to justice issues to be staged each two years thereafter.

The key themes for conference sessions were legal aid, pro bono practice, human rights, crime & punishment, family relationships and civil justice with an overall theme of moving towards universal coverage for legal services in Australia at least insofar as obtaining legal advice is concerned.

Conference Papers: Select conference papers listed below are available for download as PDF files. Copyright in articles is retained by individual authors.

Access to Justice (PDF 22.3KB) by the Hon Murray Gleeson, Chief Justice, High Court of Australia.
Access to Justice (PDF 104KB) by Julian Burnside, QC, Victorian Bar.
The agenda for civil justice reform – The English experience – Evolution of an improved justice system, or disguising a curate’s egg? (PDF 248KB) by Robert Musgrove, Chief Executive, Civil Justice Council, Royal Courts of Justice, England.
Some reflections on 30 years of a National Legal Aid Scheme (PDF 48.1KB) by Dr Don Fleming, Lecturer, University of Canberra.
Cooperative pro bono: finding and keeping partners: Cancer patients’ legal service (PDF 345KB) by Elizabeth Ballinger, Head of Social Work Department, Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre and Jennifer McVicar, Director, Pro Bono & Community Service, Baker & McKenzie.
Legal costs in legal aid work – muzzle not the ox (PDF 82.5KB) by Bill Grant, Chief Executive Officer, Legal Aid Commission of New South Wales.
Engaging law firm leaders in pro bono and maintaining lawyers’ interest (PDF 66.1KB) by Jennifer McVicar, Director, Pro Bono & Community Service and Kenneth Gray, Partner & Real Live Law Firm Leader, Baker & McKenzie.
Cooperative pro bono: finding and keeping partners (PDF 48.4KB) by Tony Woodyatt, Adjunct Senior Lecturer, Griffith Law School and Belinda Abey, Pro Bono Solicitor, Clayton Utz.
Unmet legal need: how to identify and meet it (PDF 1.23MB) by Geoff Mulherin, Director, Law and Justice Foundation of New South Wales.

For a report of the conference prepared by the Law Council of Australia which links to other conference papers click here (PDF 980KB) .

For the full conference program see the dedicated conference website at www.justiceprobono2006.com.au.