Crown appeal against lenient sentence
The Shopfront provides legal advice and representation for homeless and disadvantaged young people in Sydney’s inner city area. Last year we agreed to assist a Shopfront client, ‘Jason’ [not his real name], in a Crown appeal against the lenient sentences handed down for two robberies he committed. The matter was in the New South Wales Criminal Court of Appeal and judgment was entered in Jason’s favour on 21 December 2007.
In April 2006, Jason was involved in the robberies two men in their home using actual violence. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced in relation to these robberies in March 2007.
Jason grew up in Ghana and had a very traumatic childhood, during which he witnessing the brutal killing of his father. He emigrated from Ghana to Australia and suffered greatly from racial discrimination. He left school at an early age in order to work to support his mother and siblings when his mother could no longer work.
The judge took all the above factors into account and dismissed the appeal, taking into account the unique case of Jason, including not only the extraordinary, tragic and harsh circumstances of his childhood and youth, but also the substantial steps he had taken towards rehabilitation.
Successful settlement in discrimination claim
Freehills in Perth was approached by Sussex Street Community Law Centre and asked to assist with a disability discrimination claim brought by a 14 year old student and his mother. Freehills became involved once the matter had already progressed through the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission and the claim had been lodged with the Supreme Court.
The claim related to discrimination in education. The student in question suffers from dyslexia, a learning disability which is clearly contemplated by the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (Cth), but not recognised by the Department of Education and Training (department) as a mental or physical disability. The student, who is entering year 10 of high school this year, currently has the reading and writing ability of a seven year old child. This level of skill is alleged to have been caused by the department’s failure to provide appropriate educational assistance to a student suffering from dyslexia.
Freehills successfully negotiated a settlement of the claim. The settlement agreement included compensation which will be put towards private, in-school tutoring for the student by an appropriately qualified dyslexia specialist. The settlement also included a number of adjustments for the student’s future years of education to allow him to participate fully in all areas of his education.
The student’s family were delighted at achieving such as positive outcome. It was a huge relief to them after struggling for many years to gain any level of basic recognition from the department of their son’s disability.
Regulation of solariums
Freehills provided the Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC) with research assistance to consider the models used to regulate the solarium industry, both in Australia and overseas, and assess their merits and applicability in New South Wales. This issue had a lot of press coverage following the death of a young woman from skin cancer possibly related to the use of solariums. PIAC is working with the New South Wales Cancer Council to lobby the New South Wales Government to introduce a regulatory regime for solariums.
Indigenous workers’ rights secured
Freehills provided pro bono assistance to set up a corporate structure for a labour hire company run by a local Indigenous woman, supplying indigenous workers to a mine in the north-west of Western Australia.
The mine has a long history of working with the local indigenous community and encouraged them to set up an enterprise to supply labour to it on a contractual basis. Attempts by mining companies to employ indigenous people for 12 hours per day on a 14 day roster have failed for many reasons—one of which is that the many cultural obligations and activities necessary for life in an indigenous group can prevent or interfere with work.
The particular indigenous people from this western desert region only made contact with Europeans in the early 1960s. Therefore, being only one or two generations away from a traditional lifestyle, the group still practised many customary activities and there are many cultural gaps which made fitting into a western-orientated mining workforce difficult.
The assistance provided by Freehills enabled a corporate structure to be established so that the labour hire company can now trade as an entity to ensure they retain their own cultural values and requirements. The indigenous workers hired through the company still work from 6.00am–6.00pm and do the same work as the other employees of the mine, but by engaging workers on a casual basis, the company is able to gain employment for the indigenous people which will not interfere with traditional activities. This helps to provide a balance between the traditional lifestyle of living in a remote community and the labour requirements of a large organisation.
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