The Canberra Women’s Health Centre has applied for legal aid to pay for private lawyers for its defence against an allegation of sex discrimination brought last year, even though the ACT Government Solicitor was willing to represent the centre.
The bill could reach as much at $51,000.
This was revealed by documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act and subsequent inquiries.
The allegation was brought before the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission by Dr Alex Proudfoot against the centre, the ACT Board of Health and the ACT Government. The president of the commission, Sir Ronald Wilson, dismissed the complaint earlier this year.
Dr Proudfoot said yesterday (tues27oct) that it would be a waste of public money to provide legal aid when the centre could have been represented by the ACT Government Solicitor, which had represented the centre for the first two days of the hearing anyway.
The Chief Government Solicitor, Michael Peedom, said his office had represented the centre until the first two days of the hearing. This was because there were common interests between the centre and the ACT Government.
The centre was an incorporated association which attracted funds from the ACT and Federal Governments and the ACT Board of Health had some interest in how the centre was funded.
However, the centre had withdrawn its instructions and gone to a private legal firm.
The firm is MacPhillamy, Cummins and Gibson. The solicitor handling the case is interstate this week.
A spokeswoman for the Attorney-General’s department said the centre had applied for legal aid on June 30. No decision had yet been made. Correspondence between the legal-aid officers and MacPhillamy’s was continuing.
Privacy Act provisions prevented any further disclosure.
Documents obtained by Dr Proudfoot under FOI show MacPhillamy’s charged the centre $51,697.26.
The convener of the management committee of the centre, Jane Ingall, said the centre had sought independent advice because the centre was community-managed and based as an incorporated association, unlike the Women’s Health Service. The centre provided information and referrals, not clinical services like the service, therefore its arguments before the commission would be different.
She said the centre had felt a responsibility to get the best independent advice it could get because there were similar centres throughout Australia that could come under threat. There was no complaint about the ACT Government Solicitor who was doing a good job. There was some commonality in the cases, but enough difference to warrant separate advice.
In fact Sir Ronald found for the centre on different grounds than for the service. Both were discriminatory but the clinical service was lawful because it provided services which of their nature could only be provided to women, whereas the centre was lawful because it was aimed at ensuring equality of services under the temporary-special-measures provision of the international covenant.
Dr Proudfoot’s FOI documents show that the centre also obtained funding from the Public Interest Advocacy Centre, which in turn obtained about $80,000 in Commonwealth funds this financial year.
Dr Proudfoot asked the Attorney-General’s Department in a letter how his department “”justifies funding PIAC as a community legal centre when PIAC choses to expend so many of its resources representing a party which is already in receipt of substantial public funding against a lone, unrepresented person seeking relief from discrimination”.
He wanted to know why the public interest required the PIAC to support the side which was already supported by the Government instead of the side of the citizen alleging discrimination.
The director of the Office of Legal Aid and Family Services, Oliver Winder, said, “”The Commonwealth does not require organisations to justify involvement in particular cases. We would consider this to be a breach of solicitor-client confidentiality.”