Human Rights Law Centre publishes latest equitable briefing data
In 2022, the Human Rights Law Centre adopted an equitable briefing policy to guide and improve our briefing of barristers.
The legal profession does not currently reflect the community that it serves, and as a human rights organisation we have a responsibility to help address this. Working with counsel who have a diversity of perspectives, experiences and backgrounds is good for our clients and good for the profession. The policy was developed in consultation with a range of stakeholders across the profession.
Consistently with the principles of transparency and accountability which underpin the policy, we are pleased to publish our briefing data for the second full financial year of the policy’s operation.
We have set targets to offer more briefs to barristers who are Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander, people of colour or who have a disability, and barristers who are women or gender diverse. Additionally, we have pledged to increase the number of briefs accepted by diverse counsel in comparison to the prior year’s briefing data. The policy also sets out a range of other initiatives to ensure the Centre is contributing to fostering greater diversity within the legal profession.
In FY2023-24, we offered 55 briefs to barristers. 12 of these briefs were to barristers who are Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander or people of colour (22%), exceeding our target of 15%. 11 briefs were offered to people of colour and one was offered to an Aboriginal barrister. No briefs were offered to barristers who disclose being a person with a disability.
27 of the barristers we offered briefs to were women, representing 49% of total briefs offered (just below our target of 50%). 15 of these briefs were offered to senior counsel, and of these five were women – being 33% of senior counsel briefs, short of our target of 40%.
Our equitable briefing policy requires us to seek to improve on our prior financial year’s data in relation to accepted briefs.
In FY2023-24, 44 briefs were accepted by counsel. Of these, 7 briefs were accepted by barristers of colour (16% - a three percentage point increase on the prior financial year). 19 briefs were accepted by women barristers (43% - a seven percentage point improvement). 11 briefs were accepted by senior counsel, but only one was a woman silk (9% - a significant decline from 42% last financial year).
In summary, we met and exceeded some of our equitable briefing targets, but fell short in some critical areas – particularly in relation to briefs with female senior counsel.
The Human Rights Law Centre is committed to equitable briefing and will continue to monitor, report on and strive to improve our compliance. The mixed outcomes over the past two financial years underscores the importance of a continued investment in equitable briefing practices.
In the coming financial year, we will investigate barriers to equitable briefing and ways to address them with a renewed focus on working across the community legal sector to increase representation.