Essendon Community Legal Centre

Law Reform

The Centre undertakes various law reform activities to provide community input into the law-making process. Our casework also enables us to monitor law reform. For example, new domestic violence laws introduced in 1987 appeared to address many of the issues raised by women. However, the experiences women brought to the Centre demonstrated deficiencies in the law, particularly in regard to the seizure of firearms. The Centre passed on these concerns to government consultative committees to ensure the legislation met its intended aim. Similarly, in the area of social security we have made submissions to government about the legal discrimination faced by certain members of the community.

The Centre is also an active member of the Federation of Community Legal Centres, which represents community legal centres across Victoria. The Federation has a number of working groups that focus on specific issues (eg police powers, social security, child support, access to interpreters etc). Our participation in these groups gives unified expression to the common experiences of our communities and enable us to promote law reform and policy development.