What is a health justice partnership?
Health justice partnership brings together health, legal and other services to address complex problems.
A partnership might include on-site lawyers in health settings for easy warm referrals, secondary consultations to give health and social workers the right advice, or holistic wrap-around services.
Why health justice partnership?
When you understand how legal problems affect people’s health outcomes, partnership just makes sense.
The consequences of unaddressed legal need can include income loss or financial strain, stress-related illness and physical ill health. And people experiencing social disadvantage are more likely to be dealing with multiple legal problems at the same time, while also being less likely to seek legal help.
Health justice partnership makes that legal help more accessible by embedding it in trusted health and wellbeing services.
Establishing a health justice partnership
Wondering how to start a health justice partnership? Our experience can help set you up for success.
As the national centre of excellence for health justice partnership, Health Justice Australia is your one-stop shop for setting up and building effective partnerships.
Alongside tailored support and training programs, we have a library of tools and resources to help get you on your way to establishing a successful health justice partnership.
Debt waiver requests turned Nandita’s life around
Nandita lives with an acquired brain injury (ABI) resulting from a 40-meter fall while rock-climbing, which affects her decision-making abilities. Her ABI was like “a life-long concussion,” which made it very difficult to manage her finances.
Unable to work, Nandita found herself under significant financial stress. She was evicted from her home and had to take out large personal loans to support herself.
Nandita was regularly visiting the Royal Melbourne Hospital for rehabilitation following her ABI. Her social worker suggested she might have legal needs as well as health and rehabilitation needs, and referred her to Inner Melbourne Community Legal (IMCL)’s onsite legal clinic.
IMCL sent debt waiver requests along with a letter of support from Nandita’s social worker to various debt collectors, asking them to take her circumstances into account. The result was a waiving of nearly $50,000 of Nandita’s outstanding debts.
“Now I am actually able to breathe,” says Nandita. “I can fully focus on my therapy… I can plan for my future.”