Health Justice 2025 national conference

Early risers win! Doors are open and the coffee is brewing. Get in early, grab your pass, and settle in for a day of discovery.

What does it take to listen – really listen – to the voices of people with lived and living experience? What is it that systems change requires of us, and where are our blind spots?

In this keynote with internationally renowned speaker, Liz Weaver, learn more about what it takes to navigate our fears and power challenges.

Hear more about how authentic engagement seeks to break down the power imbalances in community, and can open us to a future of deep learning and impact.

Partnership is often framed as something that happens between portfolios, services, or professional disciplines. But partnership can be transformative when it’s built directly with people and communities – recognising that each person is the leading expert on their own life.

To explore this, we’re bringing together Sijan Dahal (lived experience disability expert, law student), Rochelle Allison-Moore (Lived Experience Project Lead, CLWA), and another speaker to be announced, in conversation with HJA’s Cathy Bucolo (Manager, Capability) to share their reflections on Liz Weaver’s keynote and explore:

• Where they have seen or experienced the power of partnership
• What it means to be genuinely listened to
• How lived experience expertise can influence positive change

This conversation is only the beginning – and you’re invited to keep connecting with Sijan, Rochelle, and our soon-to-be-announced speaker throughout the conference about what authentic partnership looks like in action.

Choose from one of four workshops designed to spark conversations and deep dive into your selected topic:

Workshop 1: Power in practice: Strengthening your awareness and impact
#Inclusion #Practice

Power is the water we swim in – shaping how we lead, collaborate, and influence change. Yet despite being ever-present, it’s often unspoken, misunderstood, or avoided.

Facilitated by HJA’s Lottie Turner, this interactive workshop will help build your literacy around power: what it is, how it shows up in cross-sector work, and how to use it with more intention and impact. You’ll explore a practical tool for identifying and working with different forms of power in your own role and relationships.

We’ll also hear from Kimia Randall (Australian Centre for Disability Law) and Leah Roberts (Liverpool Hospital), who will share how they’ve grappled with power in their collaboration – reflecting on transparency, discomfort, and shared leadership in practice.

Whether you’re a practitioner, service leader, or collaborator across systems, this session will sharpen your awareness of power dynamics and help you navigate them with greater clarity, humility, and influence.

You’ll leave with sharper tools and a clearer lens for recognising power in your everyday work – and the confidence to use it more intentionally for change.

Workshop 2: The CollabLab
#Foundations #Practice

Collaboration is at the heart of health justice partnership – but what does it really take in practice?

In this hands-on workshop, HJA’s Karyn Gellie will host a peer-driven space for health, legal and social service practitioners to explore the realities of working together across services and with people with lived experience.

For this workshop, we’ll be bringing together Rochelle Allison-Moore (Lived Experience Project Lead, Community Legal WA) as well as representatives from LA NSW – Early Intervention Unit. Whether you’re new to partnership or looking to strengthen existing collaborations, the CollabLab will draw on participants’ own expertise to surface challenges, share practical strategies, and build confidence in the everyday work of collaboration.

Workshop 3: How to build organisation-wide partnership culture
#Management #Leadership

Embedding the principles of partnership across an organisation can have benefits well beyond partnering with other services. This interactive session will explore how a whole-of-organisation approach to partnership can shape service design, leadership, and day-to-day practice.

Drawing on the experience of Hume Riverina Community Legal Service (VIC/NSW), participants will hear how partnership has been embedded across their service – supported by Partnership Foundations training, the creation of a Partnership Champions Group, and strategic oversight from senior management. Together, these initiatives are helping to embed a culture of collaboration and strengthen capability across the service.

Led by Debi Fisher, Karlee Hirt, and Gabby Maginness from Hume Riverina Community Legal Service, the workshop will also feature problem-solving activities that surface common partnership challenges and support participants to test new approaches.

This is more than a workshop – it’s a rare opportunity to learn alongside peers, try out new ways of thinking, and spark practical changes in how your organisation approaches partnership. Expect to leave with both inspiration and a concrete pathway forward.

Workshop 4: The secret sauce of health justice partnership
#DeepDives #Research

We’re so excited to share early findings from our collaborative research in this workshop, which is designed for those experienced in health justice partnership.

Facilitated by HJA Research Fellow Suzie Forell, we’ll explore what makes a health justice partnership, what is needed for it to be effective, and our approach to understanding the impact of health justice partnership for frontline workers, partner services and clients.

Enjoy a long lunch at the University of Technology Sydney, and take the opportunity to chat with friends and colleagues. We’ve left you plenty of time to grab a feed, check your emails and devour the brain food on offer.

Your choice of breakout sessions, taking the concepts and insights we discussed in workshops through to their real-world applications.

1. Breakout 1: Lessons and strategies from the front line
#WomensSafety #CaseStudy

What does partnership look like in practice on the front line? This session will share real-world lessons from health justice partnerships responding to women’s safety and gender-based violence. You’ll hear case studies, insights, and strategies from those on the front line, designed to spark ideas and offer encouragement for your own partnership journey.

The session will feature:

• A presentation, Lessons from a Health Justice Partnership in Central Australia, with speakers Julianna Marshall, Adrienne Bogard, and Georgia Bath of Central Australian Women’s Legal Service.
• Improving women’s health, safety and wellbeing through partnerships with specialist women’s legal services, a panel chaired by Elena Rosenman, CEO of Women’s Legal Centre ACT and Chair of Women’s Legal Services Australia. Elena will facilitate a conversation with Jasmine Pavan of Women’s Legal Service WA, Kimberley Allen of Women’s Legal Service QLD, and Carmel Lohan of Women’s Legal Service Victoria

Together they’ll share practical experiences of collaboration, common challenges, and strategies for driving systems change in women’s legal and health services.

This session brings together some of the strongest voices in the women’s legal sector. You’ll leave with practical ideas, renewed energy, and a deeper sense of what’s possible when partnerships are built on trust, courage, and a commitment to women’s safety.

2. Breakout 2: How to build and maintain an effective partnership
#Practice #CaseStudy

What does it really take to sustain effective partnerships over time? This session brings together practice wisdom from across sectors – mental health, alcohol and other drugs, care and protection, youth justice and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health and wellbeing – to share how partnership work can be embedded, strengthened, and sustained.

Debi Fisher and Gabby Maginness (Hume Riverina Community Legal Service) join David Noonan (Albury Wodonga Aboriginal Health Service) to reflect on a decade of embedding legal help within an Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Service, exploring the lessons and insights that come from Community-led, long-term partnership.

We’ll then hear from John Bamborough (Mind Australia), who will share how a health justice approach is helping transform systems in mental health, drawing on his experience leading the establishment of three Mind-led Mental Health and Wellbeing Locals.

Next up will be a presentation from Ruah Legal Services on legal professional privilege, confidentiality and clashes of professional obligations with Sarah Toovey and Luke Cassidy.

Finally, a cross-sector team – Karlee Hirt (Hume Riverina Community Legal Service), Kathrin Baer (Gateway Health), and Claire Harris (Upper Murray Family Care) – will present on their integrated work in alcohol and other drug residential care, highlighting how partnership can improve outcomes by bringing together legal, clinical, and financial support.

Together, these stories offer strategies for managing boundaries, building allyship, and embedding partnership practice across services. You’ll leave with fresh ideas and inspiration for keeping your own partnerships alive through change and challenge.

3. Breakout 3: Health justice partnership for children and families
#EarlyIntervention #CaseStudy

What happens in your childhood can follow you for the rest of your life. The earlier we can make a difference for children and families living with adversity, the bigger a difference it will make for our whole society.

Hosted by HJA’s Kate Finch and Suzie Forell, this breakout session will feature four presentations:

• Keeping Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families together: early legal intervention in unborn child protection notifications, with Keryn Ruska and John Cattanach of IUIH Legal Service, Institute for Urban Indigenous Health.
• Health justice partnership and early-intervention child protection legal assistance with Rashini Fernando (Redfern Legal Centre) and two yet to be announced speakers.
• Just Healthy Families – Playground Partnerships with Zoe Craven and Megan Hibbs of Women’s Legal Service Tasmania.
• Expanding Mabels to the Mallee – lessons and insights with Marika Manioudakis of Eastern Community Legal Centre, and Lisa-Maree Stevens and Corrina Graham of Mallee Family Care Community Legal Centre.

4. Breakout 4: Evaluating health justice partnership outcomes
#DeepDive #CaseStudy

This session explores real-world case studies from health justice partnership evaluations across Australia, along with an introduction to evaluation and outcomes measurement.

This breakout will feature the following presentations:

• Getting the Right People in the Room- learnings from an evaluation of a hospital-based HJP with Emma Golledge and Dianne Anagnos of Kingsford Legal Centre.
• Lessons from our evaluation (spoiler alert – it takes a village!) with Lisa Ward and Laura Brennan from First Step Legal.
• Building the Foundations of Stable Futures: From informal evaluation to clinical trial with Kate Adnams of LawRight
• Outcomes measurement for HJPs using the resources that you have with Lyla Pedersen from Health Justice Australia

Take a quick break, grab a snack, and re-charge before the final conference hours of the afternoon.

In the final session to close Day 1 of HJ25, we’re bringing you a special plenary, where you’ll see complexity come to life!

Adapting a technique grounded in family therapy, you’ll see a human sculpture built live on stage. Centred on a case study, our human sculpture will visually demonstrate how hidden issues can surface.

Through this sculpture and simple movement, expect to see complexity, cross-sector partnership, power dynamics and conflict in a new and creative way.

Day One is done. Grab a drink and exchange ideas with friends, colleagues and peers. This is a wonderful opportunity to connect with people you’ve heard from and met during the conference – don’t miss out!

Doors are open for those who are registering for day 2 only. The coffee is brewing – get in early, grab your pass, and settle in for a day of discovery.

Health Justice Australia Acting CEO, Lottie Turner, takes to the stage to kick us off for Day 2 of the conference.

This plenary brings together leaders and experts in the fields of health equity and the social determinants of health and justice.

From their diverse perspectives, they will explore a future where people and families are at the centre of design, funding and delivery, and where the power of partnership is a lever for lasting system change.

In this exciting workshop, all conference registrants will engage together and with international guest speaker, Liz Weaver. Liz will introduce how to craft your impact story using two frameworks: the water of systems change and the collaboration impact story. 

We often miss the essential ingredients in writing our impact stories including how people, process, and resources were essential components of impact. During the workshop, we’ll talk more about these essential ingredients as we develop, write, and share the first draft of our impact stories.   

To close Liz Weaver’s plenary workshop, we’ll hear from Fran Lee, Disability-Justice self-advocate who is an original member of the self-advocacy group for people with acquired brain injury while in contact with the criminal justice system, Voices for Change.

Fran will share her thoughts about storytelling, how this changes people, services, systems and what storytelling means for Fran and Voices for Change.

Enjoy a long lunch at the University of Technology Sydney, and take the opportunity to chat with friends and colleagues. We’ve left you plenty of time to grab a feed, check your emails and devour the brain food on offer.

Is your organisation leading the way? What does the future of partnership look like? Choose from one of four forward-thinking breakout sessions below.

1. Breakout 1: Discover the whole picture – Working at the intersection of health and justice equity
#Equity #SystemsChange #Inclusion

This breakout session brings together diverse perspectives and lived experience to explore what it means to design inclusive systems.

We’ll begin with Maggie Korenblium (Health Justice Australia), who will share more about gender diversity and its intersections, as well as simple etiquette and awareness tools. Practitioners working at the intersection of health and justice equity should be prepared to engage with trans patients and clients in a safe and respectful way – expect to leave this presentation with handy tips and resources to apply in your work.

Next, Deborah Fewster (Victorian Council of Social Service) reframes energy hardship as a social determinant of health and a basic human right. Deborah will explore how collaboration across the energy, health and community sectors can address energy inequity, sharing resources and insights from the VCOSS “Tackling the Energy/Health Hardship Nexus” initiative.

Simone McKenry (NOFASD Australia) will then share how partnerships with lived experience experts can challenge stigma and reshape responses to Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD). FASD is often perceived through a lens of blame and shame, especially for biological parents, resulting in underdiagnosis and lack of support. Drawing on national survey data and co-designed interviews, we explore how a shift toward strengths-based, trauma-informed partnership can improve access to justice, health, and education systems.

Finally, Jane Lee (Deafness Forum Australia) will shine a light on hidden disabilities, particularly hearing loss, and how they shape people’s interactions with health and justice systems. Jane will explore how hearing loss can limit access to care, participation and justice – and how partnership and empathy can help create more inclusive, human-centred systems.

Together, these presentations invite us to reimagine what equitable, inclusive, and responsive systems can look like when no one is left unheard.

2. Breakout 2: The anatomy of partnership capability: skills, mindset, knowledge and confidence
#Practice #Capability

Across Australia, passionate health, legal and social service practitioners are working together every day in different ways and at different levels of intensity. Sometimes it all flows – everything aligns around a shared goal. And other times, it feels like hard work just to stay connected.

That’s where partnership capability comes in.

Building and sustaining effective cross-sector partnerships takes skills, knowledge, mindset and confidence – the capability to collaborate across systems while staying anchored to purpose and people.

Hosted by HJA’s Cathy Bucolo (Manager, Capability), this session will bring together expertise from the field and beyond, including:

• Michele Leering, Visiting Scholar at Queen’s University Faculty of Law and former Executive Director, Community Advocacy & Legal Centre (Canada).
• Hailey Ha, recent law student graduate.
• Plus additional speakers yet to be announced across health and community services, Aboriginal legal access, and legal aid.

Together, we’ll ask and explore: what is the capability needed to partner to address complex need?

Expect to leave the session with new insights and a practical action plan for strengthening your own partnership capability.

3. Breakout 3: Policy, funding and health justice partnership
#PolicyMakers #Government

What are the power dynamics that influence the policy and funding environment, and how do these actors respond to, learn from, and build upon innovation? This session will discuss opportunities to contribute to health and social policy reform and funding initiatives to better support collaborative ways of working.

4. Breakout 4: Shaping the collaborative, early response workforce of the future
#Leadership #FutureWorkforce

What will it really take to build a workforce that can deliver collaborative, early support – one that centres people and families, not just systems?

In this roundtable, leaders from health, legal assistance, and social services will work together to imagine that future and map out what it could look like in practice. Using a “future scenario” approach, we’ll explore:

• What will be true of this workforce – and what will they be doing differently?
• What organisational and system changes will make it possible?
• How will collaborative leadership and practice shift to enable it?
• What supports and mindsets will sustain those changes?

Lottie Turner, Acting CEO, Health Justice Australia, will host this session. She will be joined by Dr. John Chan, Managing Director of Infinite Potential, an internationally recognised expert on workplace wellbeing, burnout, and the future of work.

Participants will leave with their “3×3 gold” – three new connections, three practical takeaways they can apply now, and three things they’re ready to unlearn.

This is a session for executives and decision-makers who can shape the workforce of the future – and who are ready to move from ideas to action.

Take a quick break, grab a snack, and re-charge before the final conference hours of the afternoon.

In times of uncertainty, constraint and complexity, what does it take to keep showing up – or to step back – while holding onto collective hope?

This closing plenary brings together leaders who have, together, spent decades navigating and shaping complex, collaborative systems change across health, justice, and community sectors. Their leadership has been defined not by hierarchy, but by their ability to build connection, enable learning, and sustain collective purpose amid shifting conditions.

Facilitated by Lottie Turner, Acting CEO at Health Justice Australia, the panel will:

• Explore how personal and professional identities intersect in leading complex systems change
• Reflect on the lessons learned from decades of practice at the boundaries of systems, disciplines, and communities

• Share the practices, mindsets, and relationships that sustain them through uncertainty and change
• Draw together the threads of the conference to imagine what it takes to lead and collaborate with hope and integrity

As the final conversation of the conference, this session offers a chance to pause, reflect, and reconnect to what sustains us – as practitioners, leaders, and changemakers working toward more connected, resilient, and just systems.

Health Justice Australia Acting CEO, Lottie Turner, takes to the stage to close things out for 2025.

Absolutely not!

If you work in health justice partnership, great! This conference is definitely for you.

If you don’t, but you’re interested in how services can work better together to address unmet need, this conference is also for you! You might be grappling with some of the same challenges as those currently working in partnership, you might be interested in how policy environments and funding impact this kind of work, you might be interested in the data that sits behind these kinds of innovations, or you might be a member of a community looking for solutions to the problems you’re facing.

Still not sure if it’s for you? Get in touch at conference@healthjustice.com.au 

We’re pleased to share that we have single day tickets available! Head over to registration checkout to purchase yours now.

HJ25 will be in Sydney at the Aerial Function Centre, UTS, in Ultimo.

Yes. Just select ‘invoice’ payment option at checkout.

One of our main objectives for HJ25 is for participants to make connections with each other, and feedback from attendees of past conferences is that they highly valued the opportunity of one large, national event where this connection can happen in-person. For these reasons, and because all of HJA’s other offerings are online in between conferences, HJ25 is an in-person only event.

We’re pleased to offer the following cancellation and refund policy:

• Cancellations up to 30 days before conference incur a $150 administration fee.
• Cancellations between 29 and 14 days before conference receive 50% refund.
• Cancellations less than 14 days will not be refunded.

Absolutely. You can transfer your registration ticket to another name up until 4 business days before the conference at no cost. Reach out to events@healthjustice.org.au to request the transfer.

Unfortunately, tickets cannot be shared between multiple people. However, we do have single day tickets available for those who are available to only attend one day of the conference.

Health Justice 2025 aims to be a fully accessible conference. You will be able to provide your accessibility needs during the registration process. We encourage you to be as detailed as possible. Your registration information will be treated with confidence and respect.

Do you need assistance in registering? Please email us at conference@healthjustice.org.au to arrange an assisted registration session.