Illawarra Legal Centre staff have lobbied Labor federal candidates for ongoing and secure funding so they can continue to provide much-needed services to the community.
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Labor's shadow attorney-general Mark Dreyfus visited the Warrawong centre yesterday as part of the election campaign along with Cunningham candidate Alison Byrnes and Whitlam incumbent Stephen Jones.
The centre provides legal advice and services for tenants, welfare rights, financial counselling, Aboriginal legal programs, child support, children's court proceedings and other services for free.
Staff solicitor Ian Turton said funding for many of the centre's services would run out on June 30 and the government had provided no certainty beyond that date, therefore making it difficult to attract good employees.
"There is a real need for a shake out and security in our sector," he said.
"There is no security in our funding, and that is a significant issue that needs to be addressed."
Mr Turton also wanted the next government to address the "disgraceful" robodebt scheme that affected many Illawarra centre clients.
He also called for Jobseeker payments to be increased by a minimum of $50 a week.
"That did not occur under the current government and it needs to occur under the next one," he said.
Mr Turton also said there were many injured workers in Wollongong who were potential applicants for the disability support pension.
He called for the pension process to be "reviewed" and "looked at as a priority" by the next government.
Mr Dreyfus said he enjoyed meeting with the employees who did "some of the hardest and best legal work" for members of their community.
"Funding for community legal centres is an area of Commonwealth administration that we are going to have to look at closely if we can win the next election," he said.
"I am very concerned about how services like this are stretched to breaking point by the demand.
"What the centre needs is recurrent funding so they can employ enough people to provide the services this community needs.
"What has been described to me is the need for predictability of funding so they know beyond June 30 if they will have funding into the future.
"They also need to know the amount of funding because without that it is hard to attract good staff when they might be out of the job on June 30. We will look into it."
Ms Byrnes also said, if elected, she wanted to work closely with the centre so they had certainty around their funding.
"After June 30, some of their funding runs out so that leads to a lot of uncertainty, especially for staff," she said.
"They need funding stability and predictability to work out where they can go over the year ahead."
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