Making a difference

Having seen the resolution of a number of our clients' cases in recent weeks in New South Wales, it occurred to me that as plaintiff lawyers acting for clients with serious diseases and injuries, we don’t think frequently enough about the difference we have made to our clients’ lives and we ought to reflect more upon that. After all, there's always the next client to help and support.

Compensation is not a windfall.?It compensates for real, genuine loss. The loss of life, the loss of a carer, the loss of an ability to provide for a family or care for a child. All things which most of us take for granted. All too often, injury or illness serves to place clients or families in situations where in the absence of that compensation, they would struggle to make ends meet.

Money is only that, but it provides choices to clients and is the only outcome that can be achieved in litigation in an attempt to put the injured individual or family back in the position they would have been in had the injury not occurred. Clearly this is theoretical, and I can honestly say that every one of my clients over the last 30 years would wish they could turn back the clock to a time before they had developed their disease or suffered injury.

But that’s why I am proud to have been a part of so many clients’ lives, helping them to obtain compensation to fund cutting edge medical treatment, to help pay for care at the end of their lives, to provide an alternative carer for their partner with dementia, or to support families whose main earner has no longer been able to work to provide for the family as a consequence of their illness.

All of these are the real outcomes of our endeavours; the chance to make a real difference to real people’s lives.