Legal practitioners in South Australia might be facing their toughest battle yet, and the challenge has more to do with economics than the letter of the law. Significant budget cuts recently issued by the Australian government have deprived millions of citizens their right to public legal services. David Caruso, the president of the Law Society of South Australia, warned that this development could lead to criminality later on. Meanwhile, the Law Society of SA is seeking other measures to provide economic means to practitioners of an embattled legal market.
ABC broke out the news about the budget cuts. South Australia's Legal Services Commission (LSC) was reducing its budget by $10 million over the next four years. At the same time, almost a million dollars had been shaved off from the state's Community Legal Centres. As a result, the LSC had to cope with the legal demands of the public with a staff less 9% of its usual workforce. More significantly, more than 15,000 South Australians had been deprived of their rights to legal aid.
Caruso described the ominous consequences of this turn of events: " ... underfunding legal aid means denying citizens their legal rights, That entrenches hardship, leading to greater welfare dependence and even increased criminal activity."
In a related report by Lawyers Weekly, Caruso is outlining a campaign that will help beef up the South Australian legal market which the article notes is in a state of decline. One strategy is to promote South Australian legal services to an international market, and establish the state as a destination for Asia-Pacific clients seeking legal assistance.
Caruso said they are currently eyeing potential clients in countries like China, India, Malaysia, Pnilippines, and Singapore.
Another strategy for ensuring a robust legal market is stated by The Advertiser's interview with Caruso. He advocated replacing multiple judges to oversee a case with just one who will govern it from a case's start to its end. This move will reduce court backlogs and cut costs.
