ECLC in collaboration with Victoria Law Foundation and the Victorian Federation of Community Legal Centres has published a webinar and supporting materials to share its insights and experience of delivering services remotely to people experiencing family violence.

ECLC recommends the following steps for delivering essential remote services to those experiencing family violence:

1. Access external services and specialised information and support
2. Review your intake policies and processes
3. Assess the level of risk involved
4. Manage your risk as a legal service and refer to specialist agencies for more comprehensive safety planning where appropriate.

Check out ECLC’s Family Violence and Remote Legal Service Delivery guide, slides, and webinar also below:

ECLC’s focus

ECLC has a major focus on assisting victim/survivors of family violence with a range of multidisciplinary, specialist and broader programs.

A number of the specialist programs work with clients remotely (off site and by phone) and utilise careful approaches to support client safety in this context, particularly in the use of technology.

With the impact of COVID-19 and isolation restrictions being implemented, ECLC (like other services) has made some rapid changes to its service delivery model, making to enable continued legal assistance is provided to those most at need, particularly people who are at an increased risk of experiencing family violence or where the violence may escalate.

ECLC provided training to its broader legal team and intake staff to increase safety as they moved to remote service delivery as usual practice. ECLC was requested to offer some of these insights and techniques more broadly.

The purpose of this webinar is to share some of ECLC’s thinking, knowledge and experience as a Centre as a guide to your thinking and how you may ensure that the processes you establish for providing remote service delivery, consider the safety of people experiencing family violence.

ECLC thanks the Victoria Law Foundation and the Federation of Community Legal Centres for their assistance in the production of these resources.