The timeframe

October 2021 - December 2022

The work

Katherine Women's Legal Service Community Education Project (KWILS CLE)

The client

Katherine Women’s Information and Legal Service (KWILS) is a leading organisation providing free legal advice and representation to women in the Katherine and Big Rivers region. They offer comprehensive support services and prioritise community legal education to empower women with knowledge. With a dedicated team of solicitors, support workers, and an Aboriginal liaison officer, KWILS ensures holistic service provision and promotes equality and access to justice.

The problem

Driving Community Legal Education (CLE) with HutSix: Empowering KWILS to Address Domestic Violence and Provide Legal Education

KWILS, funded by a grant to address COVID-19 accessibility issues, partnered with HutSix to enhance its delivery of Community Legal Education (CLE). HutSix deployed female business analysts to KWILS in Katherine for a comprehensive scoping exercise. During their visit, the analysts engaged with KWILS staff and local service providers, gaining insights into the barriers faced by at-risk women and victim-survivors in accessing legal information and services, particularly related to domestic violence. They discovered language and cultural barriers, fear of retribution from entities like Territory Families, and misconceptions around legal advice.

Many service providers were unaware that KWILS offers discreet legal advice without obligating clients to pursue legal action. Misconceptions and a lack of comprehensive understanding of civil rights hindered women from seeking help for the issues they faced.

HutSix identified a key challenge for KWILS in CLE delivery: insufficient community awareness of KWILS and its scope of service in the Katherine Big Rivers region. High staff turnover further contributed to this issue. HutSix proposed software solutions to increase KWILS' visibility, improve community legal education on domestic violence, and overcome delivery hurdles in the vast service area.

With HutSix's technology solutions, KWILS can enhance its legal services and education, particularly in addressing domestic violence. This collaboration supports stakeholders and lawyers in assisting vulnerable women and aligns with HutSix's vision of creating opportunities and changing lives through integrated solutions.

The solution

Empowering NT Communities: HutSix's Innovative CRM System Enhances Legal Services for At-Risk Women Experiencing Domestic Violence.

As part of our mission to enhance community civil legal services, HutSix embarked on a project scoping trip to Katherine, Northern Territory (NT), with the goal of improving the services of Katherine Women's Information and Legal Services (KWILS). Throughout the project, we remained focused on addressing the unique challenges faced by KWILS in this NT region, particularly in relation to domestic violence (DV) support and assistance.

Recognising the importance of KWILS' existing case management system, we strategised to develop a customised Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system specifically designed to house Community Legal Education (CLE) resources, with a special emphasis on DV-related information and support. Our goal was to create an intuitive and user-friendly CRM that would make DV-related resources easily accessible, shareable, and updatable for KWILS staff and stakeholders across the NT and Australia.

By transitioning from isolated PowerPoint presentations to a robust CRM system, we aimed to facilitate better knowledge sharing within KWILS and with stakeholders throughout Australia, focusing on DV prevention, awareness, and support. The CRM would also integrate a streamlined booking, feedback, and follow-up system for DV-related CLE sessions and provide comprehensive reporting tools to assess the impact of these sessions on at-risk women in the NT.

Throughout the project, we recognised the importance of engaging with service providers and community organisations working in the DV sector as the first step in distributing DV-related CLE resources. This approach aimed to foster a wider understanding of the comprehensive DV support services KWILS offers across the NT. We also identified challenges such as the need for secure and confidential communication channels for at-risk women accessing DV-related legal information and services.

Moving forward, our project will focus on enhancing the CRM system to better support at-risk women experiencing domestic violence, ensuring they have access to vital legal resources, assistance, and support. At HutSix, we are committed to creating innovative solutions that empower KWILS and other NT-based community organisations in their efforts to address domestic violence and provide comprehensive legal services to at-risk women in the NT and beyond.

The results

Stage 1 of the KWILS project was rolled out in July 2022. The success for Stage 1 of the KWILS project will be measured against:

• KWILS’ ability to provide training to service providers remotely and in person 
• an increased awareness of KWILS within the community 
• ability for KWILS to document their IP in one location.
  

The progression

As we move through to the second stage of the KWILS project, we have identified more areas for improving KWILS ability to reach users, including re-doing their website. We’ve also subcontracted bellette to create a series of videos that will be placed on the app and website, to explain what KWILS does and different civil law issues that face women in their region. This comprehensive approach to developing a platform and creating educational materials to sit within it has added a lot of value to our client, as we continue to work with them and re-assess milestones and success.

The second stage of the app means that we will be able to provide an automated referral system to service providers. This will allow service providers to refer clients to KWILS in a streamlined manner, and share the administrative overhead. The second stage was completed at the end of 2022.