The Minns Government’s 2026-27 NSW State Budget fails to adequately fund Legal Aid NSW and free legal services, pricing vulnerable citizens out of the justice system. Today’s budget confirms that both State and Federal Labor Governments have chosen to leave some of the state’s most vulnerable without access to justice.

The state budget failure further entrenches the underfunding of organisations like Legal Aid NSW, Community Legal Centres (CLCs), and Aboriginal Legal Service (NSW/ACT) limiting their ability to do their vital work and follows a federal budget that forced Legal Aid NSW to cut Family Law Services and Independent Children's Lawyers. 

The state budget also does not meet the growing pressure on private lawyers who deliver legal aid on funding grants. Legal Aid NSW is heavily reliant on private lawyers to deliver services in regional areas, especially in locations where there are no CLCs or Legal Aid NSW services. However, due to dwindling Legal Aid Grants, one in three private lawyers plan to do less legal aid work within the next five years, in which 11% said they will definitely stop doing legal aid work in 2025-26, according to a 2025 Legal Aid Census. If those lawyers stop taking legal aid matters, there is no fallback and the consequences will fall hardest on regional and remote areas. 

To avert the collapse of access to justice, the NSW Council for Civil Liberties (NSWCCL) calls on both the Commonwealth and NSW Governments to end legal assistance service cuts and act on four targeted priorities:

• Provide sustainable, needs-based funding under the National Access to Justice Partnership (NAJP), with mandatory NSW Government baseline co-contributions to match ALS(NSW/ACT)’s immense state-law casework.

• Double NSW Government funding to Community Legal Centres (CLCs), including indexed baseline increases and a dedicated legal framework for climate disasters like floods and bushfires. 

• Ensure the NSW Attorney-General immediately delivers unspent funding streams to the CLC sector, including $3-3.5 million of Commonwealth funds promised in the National Access to Justice Partnership, without further delay.

• Conduct impact assessments before implementing any justice system reforms that affect the capacity of Legal Aid, CLCs, ALS, and other free community legal services; and appropriately increase funding when reforms increase demand on frontline legal services.

The Justice on the Brink modelling found that adequately funding the sector would return $600 million annually in economic and social benefits nationally, through reduced court costs, early dispute resolution, improved livelihoods and avoided downstream expenditure on health, housing and the justice system itself. CLCs in particular are designed for early intervention to resolve disputes before the escalation to litigation, reducing pressure on courts and tribunals. 

NSWCCL calls on the NSW and Commonwealth Governments to immediately reconsider their inadequate funding allocations in the 2026–27 Budgets to restore vital legal safety nets in NSW.

Comments attributable to Timothy Roberts, NSWCCL President:

“Access to legal assistance is not an optional luxury, It is an essential public infrastructure as fundamental to a fair society as health and education. By failing to fund legal services, the Minns Government is forcing vulnerable members of the community to navigate complex legal crises entirely alone. 

“This is not only a repugnant approach to public policy, it is a costly one. We all pay the price, both as taxpayers and in the erosion of our access to justice when existing services and proceedings are bogged down trying to address the unmet needs they are not well placed to meet. ” 

“Frontline community legal services are already turning away vulnerable people experiencing escalating state-law crises, including housing insecurity and domestic violence. Compounding this, the NSW Government has left vital state-allocated funds and Public Purpose Fund streams entirely unspent due to delayed tendering processes. Legal Centers are facing critical capacity shortages while approved public money sits completely idle.”

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