National Access to Justice Partnership 2025-30
The National Access to Justice Partnership 2025-30 (NAJP) is a National Agreement between the Australian Government and all states and territories that provides Australian Government funding for legal assistance services. The NAJP takes effect on 1 July 2025, once the National Legal Assistance Partnership 2020-25 (NLAP) expires on 30 June 2025.
The Australian Government will provide $3.9 billion over 5 years to fund services delivered by:
- Legal Aid Commissions (LACs)
- Community Legal Centres (CLCs)
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Services (ATSILS)
- Family Violence Prevention and Legal Services (FVPLS)
- Women’s Legal Services (WLS)
The NAJP is the Australian Government’s largest investment in legal assistance. The increased and ongoing funding will ensure essential frontline services can operate more effectively and help the most vulnerable people in the Australian community to access justice, including people experiencing family, domestic and sexual violence.
The NAJP will:
- quarantine funding for individual parts of the legal assistance sector, providing greater certainty to legal assistance providers across Australia
- reduce pay disparity between community legal services and Legal Aid Commissions, enabling community legal services to recruit and retain lawyers
- index funding to respond to changing economic conditions, meaning funding levels will be maintained in real terms
- simplify funding streams to reduce fragmentation and administrative burden on services
- support progress under the National Agreement on Closing the Gap
- deliver essential long-term reforms to create a strong and sustainable legal assistance sector, and
- prescribe governance and accountability requirements to ensure legal assistance services are providing value for money and operate in an accountable and responsible way.
The NAJP was informed by the Independent Review of the NLAP, undertaken by Dr Warren Mundy.