Seniors Rights Service is a community organisation dedicated to protecting and advancing the rights of older people, particularly vulnerable and disadvantaged groups.
We provide free and confidential telephone advice, aged care advocacy and support, legal advice and community information to seniors across New South Wales.
Legal
Our legal service provides information, referrals, advice and other assistance to older people in NSW on their legal issues. We are a fully accredited community legal centre.
Some of the many issues that we advise on include:
- Credit and debt
- Discrimination
- Elder abuse and financial exploitation
- Employment
- Family law (not including property settlement)
- Fines and motor vehicle accidents
- Issues with neighbours
- Guardianship and later life planning
- Residential tenancy and land lease communities
- Victim / survivors of violence
- Victims compensation, National Redress and Stolen Generations Reparations
Retirement village legal advice on disputes with retirement village management or interpretation of retirement village contracts.
Residential age care legal advice.
Strata legal advice on disputes with strata committees, owners corporations or strata management agents as well as on strata collective sales or redevelopment proposals.
Documents for the future, such as a Power of Attorney, Guardianship and Advance Health Care Directives
More information about our legal services
Advocacy
If you have questions or concerns about aged care services, Seniors Rights Service is here to help.
Our professional and caring aged care advocates will help you by:
- Listening to your concerns
- Providing information about your rights and responsibilities
- Helping resolve problems or complaints with your aged care service providers
- Speaking with your service provider if required
- Referring to other agencies that can provide additional support, if necessary
Seniors Rights Service advocacy work raises consumer issues on behalf of vulnerable older people to government, the aged care system and the community.
Our team of specialist financial advocates help older people with increasingly complex aged care financing arrangements.
They can help with the income and assets assessment process for residential aged care and offer information and support on a range of different issues concerning government funded aged care.
More information about aged care advocacy
Information
We provide targeted rights-based information to a diverse range of older people regardless of cultural background or sexual orientation.
Our aged care advocates, solicitors and education staff travel across NSW to support aged care recipients and the wider community.
We hold information sessions at community groups, clubs, social and professional groups, aged care homes and retirement villages. We also organise forums and discussion panels. We collaborate with organisations and community groups to develop and implement projects on specific issues such as financial abuse of older people.
Learn more about our information services
Community engagement
We provide a range of community engagement programs and activities to meet the changing needs of our community.
Home Care Check-In Project is a pilot project in the Hunter New England area offering proactive, preventive advocacy support to older persons with complex needs and/or higher risk of experiencing harm. This service includes face to face and phone check ins, pre-emptive intervention referrals and information provision.
Our Community Network Development project increases awareness of referral pathways to advocacy services for older people. Focusing on raising awareness of aged care advocacy services via community based activities and events, as well as the promotion of an Aged Care Self-Advocacy Toolkit.
We work with OPAN to deliver the Planning for Diversity workshop series to aged care providers. The project offers practical information and tools to make aged care services more inclusive of older people from diverse and marginalised groups.
Learn more about our community engagement projects
Diversity and priority populations
The needs of some groups in our community often go unmet by mainstream services. Therefore Seniors Rights Service prioritises assisting people who are:
- disadvantaged and vulnerable
- Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander
- culturally and linguistically diverse
- lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer, other
- in regional, rural and remote locations
Our organisation values diversity and welcomes all older people across NSW to access our legal, advocacy and information services regardless of race, disability, religion, sexual orientation, nationality, gender or marital status. We play an active role in tailoring our services to meet the needs of diverse communities.
Funding
Seniors Rights Service is a community legal centre and is accredited by the National Association of Community Legal Centres.
Seniors Rights Service receives funding from:
• Older Person’s Advocacy Network (OPAN)
• NSW Fair Trading
• NSW Department of Communities and Justice
• Legal Aid NSW
