Poverty Law and Social Change

The story of Australia's first non-Aboriginal community legal centre, which opened in 1972 at a time when access to legal assistance was largely denied to people on low incomes, marking the beginning of a period of legal radicalism in Australia.

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'Law for the Poor' and 'Lawyers for the People' declared the headlines that announced the opening of the Fitzroy Legal Service in December 1972. In a dingy town-hall basement in one of the poorest suburbs of Melbourne, this new legal service set out to do the unthinkable: to provide free legal advice to all comers. Almost a quarter of a century later, under an equally radical Liberal government, the Fitzroy Legal Service has found itself cast in the unlikely role of a defender of the status quo against reforms that threaten judicial independence and restrict the availability of legal aid. John Chesterman traces the evolution of the Fitzroy Legal Service from a thorn in the side of the legal profession to a valued contributor to legal debate. In this process, he provides an entertaining and perceptive account of the forces that have prompted legal reform in Australia from the early 1970s, particularly in the development of legal aid.