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Concern over funding cuts to Indigenous Law Centre supplied by NILCA 3 May 2014
I
n response to the recent announcement of funding cuts to the Indigenous Law Centre (ILC) the National Indigenous Lawyers Corporation of Australia (NILCA) calls on the greater community to support the survival of ILC. Based out of the University of New South Wales (UNSW) the ILC is Australia’s only Indigenous law research centre. The ILC publishes the Indigenous Law Bulletin (ILB) and the Australian Indigenous Law Review (AILR). Operating since 1981, the ILC is the latest organisation that has seen recent funding cuts. NILCA Chairperson Mr. Tony McAvoy said “The ILC has been at the forefront of critical legal analysis and reporting since its inception. “The ILC is an institution within the ever developing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander legal sector and the broader legal profession. “It stands alongside the Aboriginal Legal Services. “The Indigenous Law Bulletin
ILC Director Megan Davis and NILCA Chair Tony McAvoy
and the Australian Indigenous Law Review are essential publications. “There are no other publications that lawyers and law students can turn to which draw together the wide variety of legal issues that impact on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. “ The Abbott government has made funding cuts to policy positions at both the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Services (NATSILS) and the National Aboriginal Family Violence Prevention & Legal Service (FVPLS). “While the NILCA is concerned that this is continuing a pattern of silencing Indigenous voices across the legal community, it is extremely distressing to think that
important legal, academic and cultural institutions such as the ILC are vulnerable in the name of urgent financial reform. “Once the ILC becomes defunct through lack of funding, it cannot simply resurface at some time in the future. “Its credibility and reputation have been hard won and will not be easily re-built. “The apparent lack of insight as to the effect of this decision and accompanying short sightedness is mind-boggling.” NILCA calls on the broader community to come forward in support of the ILC and its publications, the ILB and the AILR. Mr McAvoy said “I urge everybody to write to the Prime Minister, Commonwealth Attorney- General and Mr Warren Mundine as Chair of the PM’s Indigenous Advisory Council seeking a reversal of this disastrous funding decision. We must all understand that if such an eminent institution as the ILC is not understood to be of broad national importance then none of the other institutions will be immune from the treasurer’s scalpel”. Anyone interested in supporting the ILC can visit www.ilc.edu.au.
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