Organisation aims to help Indigenous law students scale financial barriers
The Law Society of New South Wales has urged law firms, practitioners, and the broader community to donate to the Indigenous Solicitors Foundation (ISF), whose public launch coincided with the law society’s celebration of the National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee (NAIDOC) Week 2026.
“I acknowledge and commend existing organisations already working on similar goals to the ISF,” said Ronan MacSweeney, the law society’s president, in a media release. “I encourage donors to these organisations to continue their generosity and to consider also supporting the ISF.”
He added that the 50th anniversary of the event honouring Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture and resistance is a reminder of the importance of initiatives such as the new foundation, which aims to help Indigenous law students access the necessary support and overcome the financial obstacles to a legal career.
According to the law society, these barriers include:
MacSweeney explained that the ISF seeks to increase First Nations representation among solicitors and to ensure that the legal profession and the justice system more accurately reflect the communities served.
“There are now 100 fewer Indigenous solicitors in NSW than there were ten years ago,” he said. “In 2014, 477 solicitors identified as First Nations representing 1.6 percent of all NSW Solicitors. However, in 2025, there were only 350 First Nations lawyers in NSW, just 0.8 percent of the profession.”
According to MacSweeney, proportionally speaking, 1,500 of NSW’s 45,000 solicitors should be First Nations practitioners, given that Indigenous peoples comprised 3.4 percent of the country’s population, per the latest census.
“Aboriginal people are overrepresented in the criminal justice system and underrepresented in the legal profession at all levels, from solicitors to judges,” said Jason Behrendt, co-chair of the law society’s Indigenous Issues Committee. “We’re the only people in Australia who are made the subject of legislation.”
“Our people are strong leaders, yet Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people make up less than 1% of all solicitors in NSW and the ACT,” said Sharif Deen, acting chief executive officer of Aboriginal Legal Service (NSW/ACT) Limited. “Eliminating barriers to entering the legal profession is essential to ensure First Nations representation at all levels of the legal system and improve justice for our communities.”
“So, if the profession, including the bench, reflects the diversity of the community, then inevitably it will follow that there will be increased confidence in that system and that system will have much more authority,” said Justice Dina Yehia of the Supreme Court of New South Wales.
“I’m confident that the ISF will make significant headway towards bringing more Indigenous lived experience and expertise to our justice system,” MacSweeney added in the law society’s media release.
MacSweeney, one of the ISF’s directors, welcomed the ISF’s other directors:
“The Indigenous Solicitors Foundation will make such a difference,” Professor Beetson said in the media release. “What we really need is a bunch of Aboriginal lawyers out there that are working in the communities, because no one will understand us more than us.”
“I think what we want to see is a just and fair legal system that creates better outcomes for First Nations people because that’s the way that we’re going to see on the ground changes for First Nations communities,” Captain-Webb added. “To think of the day where we have generations of First Nations lawyers coming from one family and how powerful that could be.”
MacSweeney thanked Gilbert + Tobin for its pro bono efforts in establishing the ISF.
