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Legal Help & Areas of Law

TEWLS can provide free and confidential legal help in the following areas of law:
Family Law

Family Law

Family Law includes legal matters about relationships, children and property. Generally, family law matters can be separated into four areas: parenting, separation, divorce, and property.

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Migration Law

Migration Law

Migration law is the law about people entering and remaining in Australia. You might need to seek help with migration law if you have questions about your visa or want to know if your visa will be affected by separation, family violence, or other changes to your family situation.

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Employment Law & Workplace Sexual Harassment

Employment Law & Workplace Sexual Harassment

Employment law is the law around going to work – it sets rules about workplace rights and obligations, including how employers must treat employees and how employees must act in the workplace. Every person working within a workplace has rights about how they should be treated, including experiences of sexual harassment.

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Housing & Tenancy

Housing & Tenancy

Having or needing a home is an important part of our lives. Whether you live in public housing, community housing, or are renting through a private landlord (including if a real estate agent is involved), you will have a “tenancy” – an agreement for you to live in your house in exchange for the payment of rent, among other things. Renting a home means you have legal rights and responsibilities.

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Deceased Estates & Superannuation

Deceased Estates & Superannuation

When someone dies, they might leave things behind, such as property, money, debts, superannuation, or other items. These things together are called a deceased estate. People sometimes leave behind a will that states what they want to happen with their deceased estate. If no will is made, then there are laws that decide who gets the deceased estate.

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Domestic, Family & Sexual Violence

Domestic, Family & Sexual Violence

Domestic and family violence is when someone who is in a ‘domestic relationship’ with you, including a partner, ex-partner, family member, or housemate, hurts you or makes you feel afraid, powerless, or unsafe. Sexual violence is being forced, pressured or tricked into doing sexual things when you don’t want to. Sexual violence can be a form of domestic and family violence, but it may also happen outside a current or previous relationship.

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Compensation

Compensation

Compensation is something given to someone in recognition of a loss, suffering, injury, or experience of a violent act. Compensation is usually money (known as “financial compensation”), but can also be a replacement item or service. In the NT, the three most common types of compensation are Victims of Crime Compensation, Motor Accident Compensation, and Workers Compensation.

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Complaints & Discrimination

Complaints & Discrimination

A complaint is a statement that you can make about something that has been unacceptable or unsatisfactory for you. Complaints can be about someone not following the rules, someone being treated unfairly, or other things. If you have been treated unfairly because of a certain characteristic, such as your race, gender, age, sexuality, pregnancy and/or an experience of domestic, family, and sexual violence – you can make a complaint of discrimination.

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Credit, Debt & Consumer Law

Credit, Debt & Consumer Law

A debt is where a person owes money to another person or organisation. Some debts come from an agreement that allows a borrower to get money, products, or services immediately from a lender and then repay them later (‘credit’). Common types of debt include loans, credit cards, phone bills, and money owed to Centrelink or another government organisation. Fines are also a type of debt.

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Who We Are Left

Who We Are

The Top End Women’s Legal Service (TEWLS) is a not-for-profit, specialist women’s legal service focused on advancing the rights of women and non-binary persons. Located in Darwin, we support women across the Top End of the Northern Territory (NT) to access integrated, trauma-informed, and culturally secure free legal and support services. TEWLS advocates to achieve justice for women, to promote women’s human rights, and to redress inequalities experienced by women.

TEWLS’ vision is a community in which women enjoy and are entitled to legal and social justice.

Our Work

Our work includes:

  • Empowering and assisting women to make informed legal choices and achieve fair outcomes.
  • Advocating for laws and policies that respect and promote women’s rights.
  • Educating women to know their legal rights.
  • Building the capacity of our community to identify and respond to women’s legal needs.

TEWLS provides services across the areas of civil, family, and migration law, and holds specialist expertise in domestic, family, and sexual violence. Critically, our client-centric service model means that a client can access legal assistance from one legal practitioner in multiple areas of law. TEWLS is able to provide free legal advice and information to all women and non-binary persons, regardless of their circumstances.

TEWLS is currently funded by the Commonwealth Departments of the Attorney General, Prime Minister and Cabinet, and Social Services, with additional contributions received from the Northern Territory Government and via pro bono partnerships

Tewls Sample Muluymuluy Asset 3
Tewls Sample Muluymuluy Asset 3
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Language & Audio Translate

Click on the play button to listen in your language:
Murrin-Patha
Tiwi
Warlpiri
Yolngu Matha

Frequently asked questions

Who does TEWLS help?

TEWLS is a gender-specialist community legal centre that provides free legal help to all women and non-binary persons in the Greater Darwin region. TEWLS is also a domestic, family, and sexual violence specialist service.

TEWLS can provide free once-off legal advice in most areas of civil, migration, and family law. TEWLS also provides casework and representation services on a case-by-case basis.

As a small team, we can provide ongoing casework or legal representation where there is hardship and/or other barriers to accessing justice. When making this decision, TEWLS will take into consideration many different factors such as health and disability barriers, experiences of domestic, family and sexual violence, cultural and/or linguistic barriers, financial hardship, and homelessness, as well as TEWLS’ capacity to assist at that time.

Please note that as a legal service, we are not able to offer second opinions when you already have a lawyer.

Our services are free. For information about how we can help, see Our Services.

TEWLS provides casework and legal representation services on a case-by-case basis. This means that TEWLS can represent clients as required, including at Court or within a mediation setting.

As a small team, we can provide ongoing casework or legal representation only where there is hardship and/or other barriers to accessing justice. When making this decision TEWLS will take into consideration many different factors such as health and disability barriers, experiences of domestic, family and sexual violence, cultural and/or linguistic barriers, financial hardship, and homelessness, as well as TEWLS’ capacity to assist at that time.

If we are not able to provide you with legal representation, we will provide you with appropriate referrals for other legal and support services, including private legal practitioners, in your local area.

You appointment will be completely confidential, including any booking information, unless we are required by law to share information that you provide (such as under Mandatory Reporting laws).

We can organise interpreters free of charge for all appointments, including Auslan interpreters. Please let our staff know at the time of booking if you would like the assistance of an interpreter.

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Advancing Women’s Rights
Free legal help for women & non-binary persons
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“QUICK EXIT” BUTTON

The TEWLS website has a “quick exit” button in the top right-hand corner of the page.

This button will close the TEWLS website and open the Bureau of Meteorology website. You may need to use this button if you are worried that someone is watching you use the computer or that you have been looking at the TEWLS website.

The “quick exit” button does not delete your browser history. This means that if someone checks your browser history, they will be able to see that you have visited the TEWLS website.

MORE ABOUT HIDING YOUR HISTORY

Remember, deleting large parts of your internet history may be dangerous. This is because it may tell someone that you do not want your internet history to be found.

If you need help with online safety and/or technological safety, you can visit the eSafety Commissioner website here or you can call 1800 RESPECT on their 24-hour telephone counselling and support service. If you are in danger, you should call the Police on 000.

DO YOU SPEAK A LANGUAGE OTHER THAN ENGLISH?

If you would like to speak to TEWLS with an interpreter:

You can call TEWLS on 1800 234 441 and ask to speak to us with an interpreter. We can organise this for free. You will need to tell us your name, your phone number and the language that you speak. We will then call you back with an interpreter on the phone.

TEWLS are able to organise interpreters for most languages, including Aboriginal languages and Auslan.

 

You can also organise for TEWLS to contact you:

To organise for TEWLS to contact you, please complete the form through the Request An Appointment button on the TEWLS home page.

DO YOU WANT TO ACCESS THE TEWLS WEBSITE IN A LANGUAGE OTHER THAN ENGLISH?

If you would like to listen to the TEWLS website in an
Aboriginal language:

TEWLS has had four Top End Aboriginal languages recorded for this website. You can click the “play” button to listen to these recordings.

The languages that are currently available are:

  • Murrinh-Patha
  • Tiwi
  • Warlpiri
  • Yolngu Matha
 

If you would like to read the TEWLS website in a language other than English:

The TEWLS website is able to be translated to lots of different languages. To change the language settings, press the “English” button in the top bar of the website and choose the language that you speak.
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