DIRECTOR’S REPORT
Written by Associate Professor Joel Townsend, Director, Monash Law Clinics.
Associate Professor Joel Townsend Director, Monash Law Clinics.
This last year, Monash Law Clinics has been finding legal need in new and unexpected places. We have been able to help sports clubs, struggling with the burden of regulatory and reporting requirements, to understand and meet their obligations. Our tax clinic has found, and addressed, instances of caprice and unfairness in our taxation system. Through our Lawyer Assisted Family Dispute Resolution Clinic, we have helped clients secure a fair share of small property pools, allowing them to avoid litigation which might have dissipated these assets.
None of these – sports law, tax law, and family law small property pool disputes – is necessarily thought of as the core of community legal centre work. Each reflects, however, the reach of the law, and the unmet legal need in unexplored corners of our system. In each, as in all our areas of practice, we rely on the support of external partners.
We are able to delve into these unexplored corners because of the support of Monash University, which for 50 years has backed clinical legal education as a means of enriching legal education while meeting legal need. Other funders – notably State and Commonwealth government, but also a range of philanthropic sources of support – have helped us to innovate and discover new areas of law in which to increase access to justice.
We are also grateful to the staff and students who do the day-to-day work, seeing clients online and at our two clinic sites. It has been pleasing this year to see the way in which this casework has been turned into impactful systemic advocacy, seeking to change the systems which affect our clients. We have drawn on client experience to make law reform and policy submissions, to deliver community legal education, and to plan strategic advocacy.
The wisdom provided in governance by Bruce Dyer and the Monash Law Clinics committee has been invaluable, as we have sought to respond to developing areas of legal need. Professor Jeff Giddings, formerly the President of the committee, is concluding his time as Associate Dean (Experiential Education) at the end of 2025. He leaves a huge legacy, having overseen huge growth in Monash’s clinical legal education program, including at Monash Law Clinics. We are thankful for his vision and passion.
Melissa Fletcher, the Monash Law Senior Manager, Partnerships and Clinics, has long been vital to the growth and health of Monash’s clinical legal education program. She, along with Kay Jamieson, Jenn Lindstrom, Fay Gertner and Emily Singh, have helped to ensure that the centre is administered well. It is their steadiness – and the commitment and conscientiousness of staff and supporters – which has allowed us to have another year of finding new ways to address the legal need of the community.
A look to the future
At 50 years, the Monash Law clinical legal education program has influenced generations of lawyers. Much can be said about its history and impact – and a good deal has been said over the course of the 2025 celebrations. What, then, to say about the 50 years to come?
I am nervous about predicting the next 50 years, in clinical legal education or in any domain. The rise of AI, and the incentives created by social media, have created boom times for futurologists and prognosticators. Foreseeing apocalypses and utopias seems to be the fashion of the day. Large language models promise big changes in professional life, so there is a temptation to focus on the changes in legal education coming our way as a product of that technological change.
However, I am drawn towards the constants of our experience in delivering legal education, and in making legal assistance available, over the decades. Today, as ever, we see people at the margins of society who struggle to manage the complexity of the legal system.
As a result, they find it difficult to realise the dignity and rights to which they are entitled. Today, as ever, we see bright and committed students who want an experience, in the course of their legal education, of the law in action. They search for a way to live out their values in their participation in Monash’s clinical legal education program.
My prediction is that these will still be features of Monash’s clinical legal education program 50 years hence. While I trust we will have done much to address the social need we observe in 2025, there will still be people at the margins, adversely affected by aspects of the legal system. There will also be law students with an interest in alleviating pain and disadvantage, who will want to express their values even as they are learning the law.
Much might change about how we deliver legal assistance over the years. Technology will likely play a large part. Community legal centres are a development of the last 50 years, and they may be overtaken by other means of alleviating legal need. I am sure, however, that legal need will continue to manifest, and I have every confidence that the law students of decades to come will want to do something about it. I feel confident that Monash will use the years to come to find ways to ensure students will be able to put their values into practice, and to help the most disadvantaged members of the community.
So, we approach the task of transformation with humility. We recognise it is only with the goodwill and support of others, that we are able to have an impact on the students and clients we see. We move into our 50th year with a deep sense of gratitude and pride at the transforming effect of the work of Monash Law Clinics.
Associate Professor Joel Townsend
Director, Monash Law Clinics