The Federal Government is looking at changing unfair laws that discourage people from taking a discrimination or sexual harassment complaint to court.

Their review is in response to the National Inquiry into Sexual Harassment and its Respect@Work report, which revealed that people aren’t taking those complaints to court because of the financial risk of having the court make a ‘costs order’ against them.

Any changes to the law that come out of the review will apply to all federal discrimination complaints, so it could have wide-ranging effects.

The Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC) is one of the legal organisations putting forward their view on how and why these laws relating to ‘costs orders’ need to change.

Senior Solicitor Mitchell Skipsey joined 2SER Breakfast to discuss.

PIAC has made a joint submission to the review with Grata Fund.