23 Jul 2024
A Ross Trust grant will help the newly named Justice and Equity Centre to further its work in exposing and presenting solutions to unfair laws, policies and practices.
The centre, known previously as the Public Interest Advocacy Centre, will use the $300,000 grant over three years to deliver strategic communications to inspire and galvanise supporters.
The Justice and Equity Centre is a national organisation that works to build a fairer, stronger society by challenging and changing laws and practices that cause disadvantage and inequality. Its work and advocacy has influenced key decision makers in support of lasting and positive change.
CEO Jonathon Hunyor (pictured) said the centre focuses on First Nations justice, disability rights, civil rights, homelessness, and energy and water justice, and its work combines
legal advice and representation, specialising in test cases and strategic casework
research, analysis and policy development, and
advocacy for systems change and public interest outcomes through media, communications, submissions and engagement with decision-makers.
The centre’s current work includes the campaign to raise the age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 14, making the NDIS fairer, and the rights of asylum seekers who are held in detention.
The Ross Trust has a long relationship with the centre, first supporting it in 2017, with grants to support The Asylum Seeker Health Rights Project to secure basic, humane standards of medical and mental health care for detained asylum seekers.
“We’re very happy to now support the centre’s communications aims,” said Ross Trust CEO Sarah Hardy. “Strategic communications have played an important role in their work, resulting in fundamental changes to laws and policies in a range of areas.”
Jonathon said that strong communications, including building effective relationships with the media, were essential to converting success in test cases, the insights of research and solution developed, into changes in law, policy and practice.
“We need the capacity to be able to respond to opportunities as well as being able to play the long game to shift the narrative on social justice issues,” he said.
This will include having resources to produce high-quality, targeted communications and supporting and empowering staff, clients and partners to influence change.
He said the Ross Trust grant meant the centre could now consolidate and build on the centre’s investment in communications over the past couple of years.
“We really value the relationship with The Ross Trust and particularly appreciate its approach to funding capacity building,” he said. “Lots of philanthropic funding goes to project-based work, and while that is very important, organisations like ours need to have capacity to pursue issues when they arise as well as being proactive.
“We want to continue to amplify the stories of people who have experienced injustice, and helping the community see how the system is failing many people. Better communications also mean we have a greater chance of persuading decision makers to move towards change.”
Jonathon explained that it is also important to have communications experts who know how to pitch a story to media - and not just the ‘usual suspects’ of journalists who are already receptive.
“We need to be able to tell stories story more effectively and be quite targeted in how we do that. We want to reach people who don’t already agree with us, otherwise we are not going to find new support,” he said.
