Description

This paper describes the work of the Top End Women’s Legal Service (TEWLS), a community legal centre, fully funded by the Commonwealth Attorney-General’s Department, providing legal advice and representation to women in the Top End of the Northern Territory. It also provides service in a number of remote Indigenous communities through the Family Violence Prevention Legal Services (FVPLS), which are run as two separate units: the Aboriginal Women’s Outreach Unit (AWOU) and the Remote Aboriginal Family Violence Unit (RAFVU). In each community a number of women are employed as Community Legal Workers, enabling TEWLS to provide effective and appropriate services. The AWOU and RAFVU activities are described, and this is combined with an overview of the communities they visit, as well as the problems facing the women. Case examples are cited to give insight into the challenges of the work undertaken by TEWLS in remote communities. The subject of traditional laws is complex, and the organisation must work within a framework that takes these laws into account. In addition, incidences of family violence are almost invariably combined with other entrenched social issues, such as petrol sniffing, alcoholism and drug abuse, and TEWLS works with the State Government to implement programs, and encourages a holistic approach to family violence that will ultimately result in its reduction.