Legislative Council - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2022-12-01 Daily Xml

Contents

Community Justice Services

The Hon. T.T. NGO (15:02): My question is to the Attorney-General. Can the minister inform the chamber about the Community Justice Services 40th anniversary event?

The Hon. K.J. MAHER (Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, Attorney-General, Minister for Industrial Relations and Public Sector) (15:02): I thank the honourable member for his question. It was asked in the chamber this week about the 40th anniversary of Tullawon Health, which I was pleased to be able to attend. On the same evening, I was able to attend another 40th birthday party, which at my age I don't do that often. This 40th birthday party was for Community Justice Services in South Australia. It was a pleasure to attend their 40th anniversary to celebrate and acknowledge the justice services organisation as such a critical legal community service in South Australia's justice system.

The Community Justice Services of South Australia started 40 years ago, way back in 1982, when the service started as the Noarlunga Community Legal Centre. It then grew to the Southern Community Justice Centre and established two permanent regional offices, one in Berri and one in Mount Gambier. Today, across each of these community justice centres in the south, on the Limestone Coast, in the Riverland, and everywhere in between, there have been invaluable services and resources available to South Australians through the Community Justice Services.

I have regularly visited the Mount Gambier-based Limestone Coast Community Justice Centre, located on Commercial Street in Mount Gambier. Just last week, I had the good fortune of visiting the Riverland Community Justice Centre in the heart of Berri, where I was able to speak to people who work in that centre about some of the important work that they are undertaking—particularly with the rising waters in the River Murray—and the different sorts of questions and different sorts of needs of the community from a community justice legal centre.

I thank all the staff at those offices, both in the regions and in southern Adelaide, who work hard to maintain the fantastic reputation of the legal services provided through Community Justice Services and help to make people's experiences with the legal system as positive as they can be.