Australia's Legal Aid Gap
An investigation into unequal access to legal representation.
An SBS investigation by Florencia Melgar and Josipa Kosanovic examined the barriers to accessing legal assistance in Australia and the unequal consequences for women, particularly those experiencing domestic and family violence. Combining original analysis of national Legal Aid and Family Court data with case studies, expert interviews, funding analysis and international comparisons, the investigation found that in the sample year studied (2020-2021) women received around half as many publicly funded Legal Aid grants as men, while exposing the structural factors behind that disparity: the concentration of Legal Aid funding in criminal law, restrictive eligibility thresholds, conflicts of interest, the cost of private representation and the difficulties faced by people navigating complex family-law proceedings without a lawyer. The series documented the experiences of women, including migrant women, facing mounting legal costs after leaving abusive relationships, examined government funding and the availability of free and community-based legal assistance, and was extended through SBS's multilingual services to make the findings and practical information accessible to diverse Australian communities. The investigation was subsequently cited in the Queensland Women's Safety and Justice Taskforce's Hear Her Voice report.
Analysis of National Legal Aid Statistics found that 65% of grants went to men, 33% to women and 2% were recorded without a gender. Legal Aid funding is heavily directed towards criminal law, where defendants are disproportionately male, while women dealing with family violence frequently need assistance in family and civil law.
3 March 2021, by Florencia Melgar and Josipa Kosanovic.
The article examines self-representation in the Family Court, including the finding that 22% of litigants were involved in matters where one or both parties lacked representation at some stage. As Legal Aid cannot represent both parties, there were circumstances in which an alleged perpetrator received publicly funded representation while the victim-survivor did not.
2 March 2021, by Josipa Kosanovic and Florencia Melgar.
The focus of this article is the domestic-violence dimension of the investigation: women leaving abusive relationships having to navigate court proceedings and complex legal processes without representation.
2 March 2021, by Florencia Melgar and Josipa Kosanovic.
This piece brings together the gender data, Legal Aid eligibility, conflict-of-interest problems, self-representation, family violence, affordability of private lawyers, migrant women's additional barriers, shortcomings in domestic-violence legal services and international comparisons.
1 May 2021, by Josipa Kosanovic and Florencia Melgar.
This article focuses on the funding architecture, examining the National Legal Assistance Partnership. It reported estimates that only around 8% of households would meet Legal Aid income and asset tests, exposing the gap affecting low- and middle-income Australians as well as disadvantaged people.
1 May 2021, by Josipa Kosanovic and Florencia Melgar.
Maria, a migrant woman who had left an abusive relationship, described exhausting her financial resources and accumulating legal debt while trying to navigate separation and the legal system.
2 May 2021, by Florencia Melgar and Josipa Kosanovic.