Salvos Legal gets the verdict

Lawyer Luke Geary had a vision to help others through his contact with The Salvation Army. Last month, that vision came to a stunning climax with Salvos Legal, an agency started by Luke, being named the best law firm in Australia.

Luke Geary had a burning desire to help people. And, with a background in law, he wanted to use the legal arena to achieve this.

So, with the help of Auburn Salvation Army in Sydney, where Luke was an adherent, in 2005 he set up a free service for clients who would otherwise be unable to afford legal assistance.

Over the next five years, Luke and a small team of helpers provided free legal advice in more than 750 cases at Auburn and nearby Parramatta Corps. Then, in 2010, he knew it was time to take the next step in the development of the service and spread its reach throughout NSW, Qld & ACT.

With Luke at the helm as managing partner, Salvos Legal and its sister, pro-bono firm Salvos Legal Humanitarian, were born.

An office was established at Surry Hills in inner-Sydney. Other offices quickly followed. Last month, at a glittering ceremony in Sydney, the meteoric rise of Salvos Legal was confirmed with its stunning announcement as Law Firm of the Year at the Lawyers Weekly Australian Law Awards.

Luke, accompanied by three other partners and Salvos Legal chaplain Major Susan Reese, accepted the award on the night.

“The award we won was not a refined category,” he says. “It was a competition against every law firm in the country as well as several from overseas who have merged with Australian law firms. So I think that says something about the scope of the competition.

“I think the award validates the fact that you don’t have to be doing the same thing that everyone else has done since the beginning of time to be successful.

“I’m also very pleased for all the staff at Salvos Legal, who each made a brave and deliberate decision to sacrifice the opportunity to potentially earn considerable wealth and instead focus their talents on working for an organisation that exists to help others. This award is vindication that they made the right decision.”

In his acceptance speech, Luke emphasised the unique work of Salvos Legal within the law profession.

“I’m convinced Salvos Legal is the best law firm because everyone is unashamedly enthusiastic about making money – nowhere else is that possible without notions of greed and self-interest coming in to play. Here, it is all done benevolently and graciously, for the greater good.”

Salvos Legal was nominated by Peter Juchau, head of retail facilities management and operations, group property financial services at the Commonwealth Bank.

“What greater law firm could there be than an organization which has access to justice, and not personal commercial gain, as the sole reason for its existence?” Peter said in his nomination.

Booth’s vision

Salvos Legal has now grown to 16 offices across NSW, Qld & ACT, employing 28 staff supported by 180 volunteers. In just four years the firm has provided free legal services in almost 11,000 matters.

The structure of the organisation is simple. Salvos Legal assists governments, the business community and other individuals who have the ability to pay for a solicitor or conveyancer to meet their various legal needs, mainly in the areas of corporate and commercial law, commercial and residential conveyancing, business law and estate law (probate). Revenue received from the commercial work funds Salvos Legal Humanitarian, which serves people who cannot afford the cost of a solicitor to advise and, in some cases, represent them in court.

Luke acknowledges that Salvation Army founder General William Booth’s proposal for a Poor Man’s Lawyer service, revealed in his 1890 book In Darkest England and the Way Out, is the inspiration for the agency’s establishment.

In his book, General Booth proposed the creation of a Salvation Army department that would include an “advice agency ...where men and women in trouble can communicate in confidence the cause of their anxiety with a certainty that they will receive a sympathetic hearing and the best advice”.

The agency, said General Booth, would also be “a Poor Man’s Lawyer, giving the best legal counsel as to the course to be pursued in the various circumstances with which the poor find themselves confronted”.

Thirdly, said General Booth, the agency would act as a Poor Man’s Tribune to “undertake the defence of friendless prisoners ...”

The three points raised by General Booth are those included in the Salvos Legal concept.

“A copy of William Booth’s Darkest England book opened to the Poor Man’s Lawyer chapter actually sits at the reception desk to our main office in Sydney,” says Luke. “And it will remain our inspiration as we continue to fulfill our strategic plan, which is to have Salvos Legal Humanitarian offices across NSW, Qld & ACT by 2020.”

By Scott Simpson

Photo credit: Adam Hollingworth

Visit the Salvos Legal website for more information