LIV President Michael Holcroft will launch the RAP that Steven Stevens, the LIV’s President in 2010, committed the institute to developing by December 2011.

It will seek to achieve a legal profession that values indigenous culture and actively includes Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in the ranks of the profession.

The LIV follows hot on the heels of the NSW Law Society, which unveiled its RAP in July, focusing on law reform and helping young indigenous people gain a footing in the profession.

The Law Council of Australia and the Community Legal Centres Association (WA) launched their own RAPs in mid 2011. Other Australian law societies are yet to develop their own.

From 12.30 to 2pm tomorrow (4 September), the LIV will host a panel discussion to consider whether constitutional recognition is the true path to reconciliation. Distinguished speakers will discuss the Expert Panel on Constitutional Recognition of Indigenous Australians report.

More specifically, the panel will discuss what would need to happen for changes to the Constitution to be made; whether the report’s recommendations go far enough - or too far; what the current political realities are and what needs to be done to achieve change.

The panelists are Ian Hamm, Yorta Yorta man and former executive director of Aboriginal Affairs Victoria; Dr Mark McMillan, Wiradjuri man and a senior lecturer at Melbourne University Law School, and Melissa Castan, deputy director of the Castan Centre for Human Rights Law at Monash University.

See LawyersWeekly.com.au tomorrow afternoon for further details on the LIV RAP.