Joint supplementary submission with the Law Council of Australia on the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia Bill (Cth)

11/11/2020

The New South Wales Bar Association has made a joint supplementary submission with the Law Council of Australia to the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee inquiring into the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia Bill 2019 (Cth).

The Bill would give effect to a proposal announced by Attorney-General Porter in May 2018 to collapse the stand-alone, specialist Family Court into one of the busiest courts, the chronically over-worked and under-resourced Federal Circuit Court. This submission outlines continued concern over the significant and growing caseloads and backlogs in the family law system, even before the COVID-19 pandemic. Many initiatives implemented since 2017 to seek to reduce docket sizes in the Federal Circuit Court to 100 cases have not succeeded in that objective. Even before COVID-19, Federal Circuit Court judges had between 400 to 600 cases in their dockets, and more than 600 in some NSW registries. Productivity Commission data and the Courts’ 2019-20 Annual Reports indicate that pending cases in the Family Court and Federal Circuit Court have continued to increase. The merger proposal will not address any of these issues or delays created by a sustained lack of funding, and will only exacerbate the pressures already facing the Family Court and particularly the Federal Circuit Court.

The submission also outlines the importance of maintaining structural and systemic specialisation through the stand-alone nature of the Family Court at the heart of a specialised ecosystem of interrelated and co-located services. This stand-alone and exclusive character is critical to providing the best protection to families, children and survivors of family violence.

The Association and Law Council continue to oppose the merger bill, alongside more than 110 other stakeholders. The joint submission is available here.