See RobertsonD., ‘Pro Bono as a Professional Legacy’ in ArupC.LasterK. (eds), For the Public Good: Pro Bono and the Legal Profession in Australia, The Federation Press, 2001.
2.
A competition was recently organised in England by Lord Chief Justice Lord Woolf to find a suitable plain English translation for ‘pro bono publico’. The winning entry was ‘law for free’.
3.
See generally McLeayF., ‘Defining Pro Bono — Exploring the Parameters’, (2002) 76Law Institute Journal51.
4.
Access to justice has become a somewhat woolly term. As a working definition we mean the ability of individuals and groups to protect and assert their rights and interests, including through participation in the process of public policy development and law reform as well as participating in adjudicatory procedures including the courts.
5.
For example, the definition adopted by the Law Council of Australia in 1992.
6.
For discussion of the benefits of viewing legal services broadly see RenoufG., ‘A Client Centred Approach to Access to Justice’, NSW Law and Justice Foundation, Access to Justice Workshop, July 2002 forthcoming at <http://www.lawfoundation.net.au/access/workshop.html>.
7.
Including drafting services in relation to contracts, funding agreements, regulatory matters, corporate structure and tax issues, mainly for non-government organisations providing welfare, legal or other community services.
8.
Formal referral schemes include those operated by or on behalf of the professional associations in NSW (Law Society, Bar Association), Victoria (Law Institute and Bar Association) and Western Australia (Law Society). In addition there are now Public Interest Law Clearing Houses (PILCH) making pro bono referrals in Victoria, NSW and Queensland and proposals to create a PILCH in South Australia. In Western Australia the Law Society's Law Access scheme has a public interest component. The Victoria Law Foundation publishes a directory of pro bono opportunities and the National Pro Bono Resource Centre will shortly list referral agencies on its web site.
9.
Alternatively firms can pay that percentage to the state, which will then be applied in some as yet unspecified way to legal services for the disadvantaged.
10.
GawlerM., ‘Pro Bono in the Suburbs and Country’, Paper given at the First National Pro Bono Conference, August 2000, cited in Victorian Parliament Law Reform Committee, Review of Legal Services in Regional and Rural Victoria, May 2001, p.273.
11.
That is, not including ‘reduced fee’ pro bono. If reduced fee pro bono had been included the comparison would be 126 hours a year by each solicitor working in a small firm against 18 hours a year for the larger firms' solicitors.
12.
Calculations based on comparisons of Table 2.8 and 2.9 in ABS, Legal Services Industry 1998–99, Report No 8667.0, 18 August 2000.
13.
The Refugee Advice Service of South Australia and the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre in Victoria.
14.
ABS, Legal Services Industry 1998–99, Report No 8667.0, 18 August 2000, Table 2.9.
15.
In 1998 there were 747 solicitors employed by the eight legal aid commissions (ABS, Legal Services Industry 1998–99, Report No 8667.0, 18 August 2000, Table 4.1). We assumed seven billable hours a day and 230 working days in the year. This is an extremely rough estimate and is relevant only in relation to the order of magnitude. Of course many legal aid lawyers would work in excess of seven billable hours a day.
16.
SackvilleR., ‘Access to Justice: Assumptions and Reality Checks’, NSW Law and Justice Foundation, Access to Justice Workshop, July 2002 at <http://www.lawfoundation.net.au/access/workshop.html> citing GiddingsJ.RobertsonM., ‘‘Informed Litigants With Nowhere To Go’: Self-Help Legal Aid Services in Australia’, (2001) 25Alternative Law Journal184. See also RenoufG., above, ref 6 and reference there cited.
17.
These ideas are explored at greater length in RenoufG., above, ref 6. The National Pro Bono Resource Centre will publish, in the first half of 2003, a review of different models of legal service provision.
18.
For example, in the Survey of Pro Bono Activities of Victorian Barristers in 1999 (A. Roberts, Voluntas, June 2000) 68% of the barristers who practise criminal and family law believed that cuts to legal aid funding in the previous three years had resulted in a large increase in demand for pro bono services: Victorian Parliament Law Reform Committee, Review of Legal Services in Regional and Rural Victoria, May 2001, p.279.
The Hon D. Williams QC, ‘Opening Address, the First National Pro Bono Law Conference: For the Public Good’, 4 August 2000; ‘Launch of the National Pro Bono Resource Centre and Opening of the Pro Bono Workshop’ 15 August 2002.
21.
See eg ConnellanG., ‘The Rule of Law: Access to Justice is Not Optional’, in Victoria Law Foundation (ed.), A Just Society: What Access to Justice Means to Twelve Australians, Victoria Law Foundation Publishing, Melbourne, 1999, and RenoufG., above, ref 6.
22.
Selected papers are published in ArupLaster, above, ref 1.
