Lawyers for the federal attorney general, George Brandis, will argue Labor opponents have no legal standing to challenge an increase in divorce fees and other family court costs which are netting the commonwealth an estimated $67,000 extra a day.
Federal MP Graham Perrott and Senator Claire Moore sought an urgent hearing in the federal court in Brisbane on Wednesday in a bid to quash the new fees, which included a 42% rise in the cost of divorce applications to $1,200 from 13 July.
Labor, which argues the rises affect domestic violence victims, has cried foul after the Abbott government raised the fees by regulation despite the Senate last month reversing budget measures containing similar rises.
Labor barrister Stephen Keim told the court Perrot and Moore had taken legal action because it could mean securing refunds for family court litigants that would not be available if the Senate simply voted down the regulation again.
But federal court judge John Dowsett suggested the challenge would be better coming from a divorce applicant or someone else directly affected by the new fees.
“I would have thought that the way for this matter to have been raised would be by the person who was asked in the family court registry to pay a higher fee,” he said.
“That would have been a better way of raising it, I would have thought.”
Counsel for Brandis, Gim Del Villar, told the court he would argue that “neither Mr Perrott nor Senator Moore has sufficient interest to obtain the relief they seek”.
Del Villar argued that “as your honour has indicated, it really should be properly brought by someone who is subject to this fee, as opposed to someone who is simply the shadow minister or shadow parliamentary secretary … whose portfolio apparently covers some of the matters”.
The judge replied that “from a fairly superficial point of view it does seem like a valid point but it may be that that’s not the case”.
Keim argued the case should be heard urgently in part because, as his clients understood, the new fees were leaving those in the family court an extra $67,000 a day collectively out of pocket.
“Each day that goes on involves the possibility of great impost and inconvenience to those individuals who are affected and the court … which would have to refund those fees,” Keim said.
Del Villar, who said it had been difficult to get instructions given the “compressed timeframe” of the case, sought a last-minute adjournment.
He said there was “no material to support … at all” the idea that there was “massive inconvenience or substantial inconvenience” to the court or its clients should refunds have to be made.
The judge ruled there was not “a sufficient degree of urgency” to deny the government’s legal team more time to prepare, granting an adjournment until next week.
Maurice Blackburn solicitor Rod Hodgson, who is acting for Labor pro bono, told reporters outside court that “obviously we were disappointed that the government was not ready to go”.
“The government was able to get a regulation knocked back by the Senate and then quickly slipped under the radar within a couple of weeks thereafter, but wasn’t ready today,” he said.
“Them not being ready is clearly disappointing but nonetheless we’re very pleased the court has allocated a date for the matter to be disposed of next week because the matter continues to be very urgent.”
