July 26, 2016
A new community legal service is now available in the South Burnett, thanks to several months of negotiation and lobbying by Member for Nanango Deb Frecklington.
The Advocacy and Support Centre (TASC), based in Toowoomba, began offering a fortnightly legal outreach at the Kingaroy Courthouse on July 14.
“People in the South Burnett have never had direct access to community legal services and this gap is something that needed addressing,” Mrs Frecklington said.
“It was a high priority for our region, especially for our most vulnerable.
“In fact, the South Burnett and Wide Bay have been noted as the two regions with the greatest unmet need in regards to community legal services.”
Mrs Frecklington said the South Burnett District Law Association had also identified this need,and had written to her suggesting TASC be brought to the South Burnett.
South Burnett District Law Association president Caroline Cavanagh said the absence of community legal services in rural and regional areas had been a concern amongst members of the legal profession for some time.
“We wrote to Deb advocating for this type of service, to help address the gap in access to legal representation in our region,” Ms Cavanagh said.
Mrs Frecklington said negotiations had been underway since February with representatives from Community Legal Centres Queensland and TASC to highlight the need and request an outreach service for Kingaroy.
“We received the good news in May that TASC would run a face-to-face fortnightly clinic in Kingaroy, and this began on July 14,” Mrs Frecklington said.
The Kingaroy Courthouse has made a room available for the clinic, which will offer general legal advice on family law, domestic violence issues, parenting issues, general civic law and advice around disability.
However, the service will be unable to provide court representation.
“I would like to extend a very warm welcome to the TASC team and thank them for coming on board to help people in our region,” Deb said.
The TASC team can be contacted on (07) 4616-9700.
