Our approach to ESG

With a national footprint and more than 1200 people, we are committed to ensuring our approach to ESG is at the heart of everything we do and is embedded in our culture. We believe that success should not be at the expense of doing the right thing, and, in our decision making, we consider our long-term impact on our people, communities and the planet.

We are proud to have taken action and voluntarily joined the UN Global Compact and are committed to implementing and advising clients on implementing the 10 UN Global Compact principles. With cross-sector expertise, our team can help with what needs to be embedded in your business’s strategy and operations.

Here is a snapshot of how we constantly improve our processes to put ESG at the forefront of how we work.

We are passionate about doing the right thing. In our decision-making we consider what is right for our planet and seek to minimise our environmental footprint.

We are a signatory of the UN Global Compact and we are committed to implementing, and advising clients on implementing, the 10 UN Global Compact principles. This includes taking a precautionary approach to environmental challenges, undertaking a variety of initiatives to promote greater environmental responsibility and adopting environmentally friendly technologies in our offices. 

Since FY12, we have achieved a 46% reduction in our per FTE carbon emissions, and we’ve reduced our per FTE paper consumption by 88%. 

We have been members of the Australian Legal Sector Alliance (AusLSA) since 2012. AusLSA is an industry-led association working to promote sustainable practices across the legal sector. Part of our membership is a commitment to publicly report our calculated scope 1, 2 and the travel component of scope 3 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions each year. 

Since 2018 we have offset 100% of the GHG emissions that we report, under the AusLSA framework, by purchasing high-quality, verified carbon credits through WithOneSeed (a forestry program in Timor Leste) and the Aboriginal Carbon Fund.

Consistent with the Glasgow Climate Pact, we acknowledge the ‘urgency of enhancing ambition and action in relation to mitigation adaptation and finance in this critical decade’[1]. We are therefore currently undertaking an audit of our scope 1, 2 & 3 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The goal of this audit is to further enhance our carbon mitigation strategies and to allow us to move towards becoming a certified carbon neutral business and to make our contribution to Australia’s commitment to Net Zero by 2050. 

We are looking to reduce all our emissions and become Climate Active carbon neutral certified by no later than 2025. This commitment means we will offset 100% of our scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions that we are unable to reduce through our mitigation activities. Australian government is currently reviewing the Climate Active frame work, once this has been published we will review this commitment .

We recognise the real and pressing environmental challenges that we all face, as well as our responsibility to reduce the impact our business has on the environment. Our goal is to significantly reduce the production of GHG, the depletion of natural resources and the generation of non-recyclable waste from our business activities. We do this by making environmentally conscious decisions about the operation of our business – an approach that’s monitored by our Environment and Sustainability Committee, our Chief Executive Partner, and our Board.

We are proud to share the results of our latest Greenhouse Gas Assessment, which measured the total carbon emissions of our firm’s business activities for financial year 2022. 

This external audit covers our full scope 1, 2 & 3 emissions, including our supply chain. We believe that the first step to reducing our emissions is understanding their source. 

We are committed to undertaking this audit annually and publicly sharing the results. This will play a role in meeting our environmental performance targets of achieving a Climate Active carbon neutral certification by 2025 and the certification of our Net Zero strategy against the SBTi corporate standard by 2025.

We enable our communities to thrive by working towards Reconciliation, providing access to justice and opportunity, and protecting and promoting human rights.

We see access to justice as fundamental to the rule of law and our professional duty as lawyers. Our pro bono practice focuses on assisting those people with the greatest unmet legal need, such as First Nations people, people who are homeless, people who are disabled, refugees and older persons.

We seek to work towards a reconciled Australia through our Reconciliation Action Plan, ensuring our people have an understanding of the true history of our country and an awareness of the First Nations cultures that have existed here for millennia. 

We also seek to develop employment pathways for First Nations people and use our legal skills to support them in their own business ventures. We have chosen to walk with First Nations people in their journey towards constitutional recognition and a Voice to parliament.

Through our long-time association with the Australian Business and Community Network, our people have provided thousands of hours of mentorship to children from disadvantaged schools. We have provided them with the opportunity to access connections and role models in the business world to assist them to realise their full potential.

Our social procurement strategy seeks to provide opportunities to a diverse range of suppliers including:

• First Nations owned businesses
• Women owned businesses
• Australian Disability Enterprises (ADEs)
• Social enterprises

Our Social and Sustainable Procurement policy guides how we work with suppliers to achieve our ESG ambitions. We recognise our responsibility to contribute to the elimination of all forms of modern slavery. Our approach aims to be consistent with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.

Within our operations, we have a well-established human resources framework of policies and procedures to ensure compliance with labour laws and regulations and with our core values. 

Our modern slavery working group is responsible for determining and implementing our modern slavery response. Our response includes undertaking modern slavery and human rights risk assessments of prospective and existing suppliers, and mandatory modern slavery awareness training for our people. 

Other initiatives include: 

• D&I targets, D&I committee
• HW Evolve – flexible working
• L&D programs
• Wellbeing support
• Anti-bribery and corruption policy
• Human rights policy
• Parenting leave
• Governance structure
• Ethics Committee
• Human rights due diligence