On Tuesday 18 November 2025, in response to questions about service delivery cuts by Legal Aid NT, the NT Chief Minister made comments calling for the reallocation of NAAJA funds to Legal Aid NT to pay for legal representation of Aboriginal clients who are ordinarily represented by Legal Aid NT. In her interview on ABC Darwin Breakfast radio, the Chief Minister’s comments included the statement that “What we want is money from NAAJA to Legal Aid to pay for their customers at Legal Aid.”
NAAJA works in a spirit of cooperation and solidarity with all front-line legal services in the NT who are delivering crucial support to vulnerable Territorians, including Legal Aid NT and their staff. Comments by the Chief Minister and requests for reallocation of NAAJA funding risk creating division amongst legal services who have a long and proud history of working collaboratively.
Fundamentally, the Northern Territory Government carries an obligation to ensure proper legal representation is available for every Territorian, regardless of race. Aboriginal people do not have a lesser right to access Legal Aid NT services than non-Aboriginal people. These comments reflect a view that Aboriginal people do not have an automatic and inherent right to access mainstream services. Funding for NAAJA’s legal services comes from Commonwealth National Access to Justice Partnership money, and NTG does not contribute funds to NAAJA’s legal service delivery.
The desire to reallocate funds from NAAJA to Legal Aid NT is based on inaccurate information and limited understanding of service delivery and funding for legal services in the NT.
Conflict of interest referrals are mandated by the Australian Solicitor Conduct Rules (and their previous equivalent in the NT) and the Legal Profession Act 2006 (NT). Every legal service in Australia is bound by these rules or similar jurisdiction specific legislation, and legal services have no control over when a conflict of interest between two clients might arise. Referrals between legal services for conflict of interest have existed for decades and are an ordinary part of practice. This ensures that all vulnerable Territorians can access impartial legal representation and reduces the number of unrepresented Territorians in the court system.
Currently, conflict of interest referrals from NAAJA to LANT are noticeably low. We have requested data from NTG to verify their claim that these referrals are causing a ‘huge additional burden’ to Legal Aid, because this assertion does not match the reality of day-to-day legal practice.
NAAJA Chairperson Theresa Roe stated, “This CLP government has given large amounts of additional money to police and corrections. They’ve also given more money to the courts, DPP and Legal Aid NT. They haven’t given a single extra dollar to NAAJA’s legal services. We call on the government to explain why they’ve increased funding to non-Aboriginal agencies, but have not made any offer of increased funding to the Aboriginal legal service.”
In this financial year, the NT Government allocated an additional $8.5 million to DPP, $3.5 million to the Local Court and $5.5 million to Legal Aid NT for ‘demand pressures’. No additional funding has been provided to NAAJA, despite the fact that NAAJA represents on average 65% of all people appearing in criminal matters.
NAAJA CEO Ben Grimes explains that “Since this CLP government came into power, there has been an average 25% increase in criminal matters before the courts. Service delivery reductions at Legal Aid NT are most likely caused by the increased workloads from this government’s legislative and policy changes, rather than conflict of interest referrals. No government department would be asked to do 25% more work without additional funding. Yet that’s what NAAJA is doing, at the same time that this government is saying that they want to reallocate NAAJA’s existing funding. The government is trying to create a distraction away from the negative impacts and high costs of their legislative changes by creating a funding argument between legal services.”
Theresa Roe stated, “We call on the NTG to, at a minimum, provide additional funding to NAAJA to match the additional funding they have provided to Legal Aid NT. NAAJA completes a significantly higher volume of matters than any other legal service in the NT and this must be properly recognised.”
Ben Grimes also stated, “The recent comments also fail to recognise the ongoing funding disparity between NAAJA and Legal Aid NT. The active caseload of a NAAJA criminal lawyer is usually around 2 times higher than a LANT lawyer. NAAJA provides legal representation in around twice as many criminal matters as Legal Aid NT, however funding levels do not reflect this. This government should be working to reduce, rather than exacerbate, the funding disparity between Aboriginal and mainstream legal services.”
Dollar-for-dollar, NAAJA is the most efficient and effective legal service in the NT. These recent comments demonstrate lack of appreciation for the enormous volume of complex work that NAAJA undertakes. The comments also demonstrate a lack of recognition for our efforts to continue delivering high quality legal services without the additional funding that has been provided to other parts of the criminal justice system.
Media contact
Comments in this media release other than direct quotes can be attributed to a NAAJA spokesperson.
Contact
Ben Grimes, NAAJA CEO
media@naaja.org.au
NAAJA MR2025-18
20 November 2025