“We don’t need people like you here,” a manager at a large national cleaning company told Eric*, a transman dealing with depression and anxiety, after he requested an adjustment to is work hours from his employer. The manager then removed Eric from the roster.

Eric approached the Roberta Perkins Law Project – Victoria’s first dedicated legal service for trans and gender diverse persons – who helped him file a claim of disability discrimination at the human rights commission. The company agreed to a financial settlement with Eric, made a donation to an LGBTQI charity and undertook to conduct disability discrimination training for all its employees.

Since its soft launch last year and named after Roberta Perkins, a pioneering Australian sociologist, writer, transgender rights and sex worker rights activist, the initiative has provided legal aid to over 50 persons. It has handled a range of calls for help – from assisting with birth certificate changes and cases of family violence, personal safety, and discrimination at the workplace to families seeking legal support for their trans and gender diverse children.

“We knew from our experience, over decades of community outreach and our learnings from the LGBTIQ Legal Service pilot project, that there was a need for a dedicated and specialist legal service for trans and gender diverse clients. We also knew from our work towards a state-wide LGBTQI legal needs analysis that the trans and gender diverse community experience particularly high rates of legal need, often stemming from greater risks this community faces in terms of discrimination, harassment and violence,” Annie Davis, Executive Officer and Principal Lawyer at St Kilda Legal Service told Star Observer. Read more via Star Observer