News

Women’s Domestic Violence Court Assistance Schemes (WDVCAS) are funded by the NSW Government and administered by Legal aid NSW. Having been initiated by CLCs, they are now hosted by various community-based organisations, as well as community legal centres.

Before the last State election the then-Premier Morris Iemma announced a commitment to provide additional funding to expand the program. This lead to a long process of review and reform of the existing services, as well as an expansion to cover courts which had not previously had any services at all.

The existing WDVCAS will cease operation on 30 June. From 1 July there will be some services remaining substantially unchanged, some which have been amalgamated and extended to cover additional courts, and some new ones will be established.

Of the WDVCASs auspiced by community legal centres, we understand that all those who submitted an expression of interest were successful. Some of these will be taking on new areas of work and developing larger services covering more courts than previously. The CLCs who will be continuing to auspice WDVCASs are:

Northern Rivers
Macarthur
South-West Sydney
Macquarie
Redfern
Hawkesbury Nepean
Elizabeth Evatt
Far West

We welcome the expansion of the program throughout NSW and the support provided to CLCs and others to assist women dealing with domestic violence in the legal system.