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Keywords: Legal Aid

  • AUSTRALIA

    Aboriginal victims of Tennant Creek's addiction

    • Mike Bowden
    • 19 November 2013
    21 Comments

    Jordan Jenkins, owner of the Tennant Creek Hotel, let the cat out of the bag: Tennant Creek is addicted. 'I mean, we are not going to go bankrupt so police can present stats to people,' he said. It seems the police are doing their job too well. Alcohol sales are declining. Profits are at risk. And so the liquor licensees of this remote town with a large Aboriginal population are pulling out of an alliance designed to reduce alcohol related harm.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Eddie Obeid's need for legal aid

    • Michael Mullins
    • 11 November 2013
    4 Comments

    Corrupt former NSW Labor minister Eddie Obeid has sought public funds to cover his legal fees. It is true that the system provides assistance to a wide range of claimants, and he is entitled to make his case. But many of those who are genuinely disadvantaged really do need legal assistance but they fail to seek it because — unlike Obeid — they are not skilled and practised at helping themselves.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    The case for funding legal services with public money

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 08 November 2013
    3 Comments

    From a liberal perspective the use of public money to fund free legal services to individuals is inherently undesirable. Even if the contracts are awarded under competitive tendering, the funding of the services is a distortion in the market. Ideally they should be left to the market to provide. And by definition they are less efficient than commercial organisations disciplined by a free and competitive market.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Labor's light on the hill

    • Frank Brennan
    • 02 November 2013
    7 Comments

    'There have been innumerable post-mortems and words of advice as to how the party with new structures, election rules, and policies can pick itself up, dust off, and win the next election. Sadly some of those post-mortems have come with more coatings of spite and loathing. It is no part of my role in the public square as a Catholic priest to offer such advice.' Frank Brennan's address to the Bathurst Panthers Club, 2 November 2013.

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  • RELIGION

    Church-state issues and the Royal Commission

    • Frank Brennan
    • 25 October 2013
    2 Comments

    'The Church should not give any appearance of hiding behind the corporate veil. Justice demands that present church leaders agree to satisfy any judgment debt against their predecessors or their deceased predecessors' estates when there is an allegation of past failure to supervise or adequately investigate a sexual predator in the ranks. Any damages should be paid from church assets.' Frank Brennan addresses the Australian Lawyers Alliance Conference, Rydges Lakeside, Canberra, 26 October 2013.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Australia's asylum seeker vergogna

    • Kerry Murphy
    • 15 October 2013
    14 Comments

    Italians are not necessarily more ethical than Australians, but the attitude of their government and local officials to asylum seekers who arrive by boat is in stark contrast with our own. The Pope called it vergogna — shameful, or a disgrace — that so many asylum seekers trying to get to Italy by boat have drowned. Australia's vergogna lies in its official attitudes of punishment and demonisation.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Blessed are the whistleblowers

    • Gillian Bouras
    • 02 October 2013
    12 Comments

    The International Day of Non-Violence on 2 October coincides with the birthday of Gandhi, who pioneered the concept of political non-violence and the notion of passive resistance, and paid the highest price for his moral choices. A great many people, like Gandhi, desire a non-violent world, in which whistleblowers and thoughtful, idealistic individuals are honoured rather than punished.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Election day reflections on religion in the public square

    • Frank Brennan
    • 07 September 2013
    12 Comments

    How clever of you to choose the day of the federal election for me to offer these reflections.  I come amongst you, not as a publisher or journalist but as an advocate in the public square animated by my own religious tradition as a Jesuit and Catholic priest engaged on human rights issues in a robustly pluralistic democratic society.

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  • RELIGION

    Church-state issues and the Royal Commission

    • Frank Brennan
    • 04 September 2013
    2 Comments

    'The Towards Healing protocol is not a substitute for criminal prosecution of sex abusers. Nor is it a cheap alternative to civil liability for damages. It is a procedure available by choice to victims in addition to criminal prosecution of perpetrators or pursuit of civil damages for negligence by church authorities.' Full text from Frank Brennan's address to the Canon Law Society of Australia and New Zealand 47th Annual Conference, 4 September 2013 at Hotel Grand Chancellor Adelaide on Hindley.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    The politics of disgust

    • Ellena Savage
    • 30 August 2013
    6 Comments

    The moral questions presented in this election demand rational action, and not responses based on aversion to 'illegal' boat arrivals, gay men kissing or the idea of giving hard earned money to government programs in the form of tax. As long as both major parties are vying for ‘politics of disgust’ votes on the backs of vulnerable people, we can’t expect a better nation. 

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  • RELIGION

    Irrational fear of the Muslim Brotherhood

    • Irfan Yusuf
    • 21 August 2013
    9 Comments

    It’s a crude and misleading line of reasoning to declare that Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood can’t be committed to democracy because it is an Islamist organisation much like al-Qaida and Hezbollah. On what basis do we label individuals or groups 'Islamist'? Or 'fundamentalist'? Or 'extremist'? How can we have a monolith amongst a set of congregations making up almost one quarter of the world's human population? The history and politics of Islam is just as complex as that of Christianity.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Labor and the Coalition's cruel credentials

    • Kerry Murphy
    • 20 August 2013
    9 Comments

    Labor is subcontracting our international obligations to poor neighbours who do not have the resources to resettle refugees who may well have trauma issues. Not to be outdone in the cruelty stakes, the Coalition has four proposals, each of which has serious flaws. Neither party has a policy that respects relevant human rights issues, or an administrative system designed to ensure the correct decisions are reached.

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