Wednesday, 9 February 2022

Court services

Dr BACH (Eastern Metropolitan) (18:22): (1730) My adjournment matter tonight is for the Attorney-General, and the action that I seek is for her to take all necessary steps to ensure that all contested matters of substance in our courts are once again dealt with in person. I spoke a little bit earlier today about the most recent annual report of the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal, and in that contribution I spoke in part about the fact that so many important matters are being dealt with on the phone. More broadly, we are seeing across our court system so many matters being dealt with via video link technology in a way that quite frankly is slower and less efficacious than it would be in person. This is a change that defendants certainly want. This is a change that lawyers want. This is a change that judges want. It would result of course in quicker and better outcomes.

Importantly—and this is something that is not often touched upon in these discussions—it would result in far better outcomes for members of our legal profession, in particular younger members of our legal profession and female members of our legal profession. When you look at the make-up of the Victorian Bar it is so fantastic to see that so many of the younger lawyers are emerging female lawyers, and yet at the upper echelons of the bar we still see a very significant gender imbalance. There has been so much written about the fact that for men it is simply a fact that there are so many more informal networking opportunities and informal professional development opportunities. And so a message that I have heard loud and clear from the many female members of the bar who I have been speaking to over recent months is that they in particular are desperate to get back to work, to engage with their colleagues once more and to continue to engage in professional development, because of course they are so serious about the administration of justice in this state and—of course in a manner that is entirely appropriate—about their careers.

Now, the Victorian Labor government says that it is appropriate, and I agree, for 80 000 people to cram into the MCG and watch the cricket. That is great. The Victorian Labor government, on the eve of the final in which Ash Barty was going to play, said that there could be 80 per cent capacity at the tennis. I agree with that. Very belatedly, we have classrooms full of kids, albeit masked—and we could do away with that—but the point is, how can it possibly be safe to cram so many Victorians into confined spaces but never to even allow 10 or 12 perfectly socially distanced people in a courtroom?

Because of the ongoing work-from-home directions, small businesses in particular have been crushed. I dare say matters of the administration of justice like this are never going to end up on the front page of the newspaper, but they happen to be so important for the many, many Victorians who rely on our court system. So again I would urge the Attorney to take all practicable steps to ensure that our legal system can get back to business, working face to face in person.