In the News

06 OCTOBER 2020

A scathing report on the ineffectiveness of the response of governments and the aged care sectors to the pandemic has been handed to the Governor-General and table in Australian parliament.

25 MAY 2020

Catherine Henry is a well-known and highly respected health and aged care lawyer with more than 30 years’ experience in this specialist field of law.  She is in demand as a media commentator on legal issues and is regularly approached for interviews on issues involving health law and on aged care reform.

12 FEBRUARY 2020

Two new major reports for the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety by Flinders University researchers show that Australia is lagging well behind other countries when it comes to aged-care funding, staffing and innovation.

01 DECEMBER 2019

June Freeman was a vibrant woman at 87 years young, but just three and a half months in an aged care facility at Newcastle saw her health quickly deteriorate, and ultimately what killed her.

27 NOVEMBER 2019

Georgie Schofield’s dad was in his early 70s when he died at a Hunter aged care home four years ago.

20 JULY 2019

A Hunter woman is urging others to “do their research” before going under the knife after her experience at the hands of the now suspended cosmetic surgeon, Dr Leslie Blackstock.

29 MAY 2019

The return of Liberal/National party governments at both state and federal level in recent elections has undoubtedly set back the cause of abortion reform – an issue that the vast majority of the voting public have consistently supported.

5 APRIL 2019

The federal budget did little for older Hunter people, particularly the growing number of vulnerable people needing aged care at home or in facilities.

8 MARCH 2019

To mark International Women’s Day (March 8) a Newcastle and Hunter law firm has launched a new, free e-resource to help women navigate the legal system.

11 FEBRUARY 2019

The spotlight is on the quality and safety of the aged care system this week, with the first hearing of the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety starting this morning in Adelaide.

20 JUNE 2018

Monique Smiles, of Catherine Henry Lawyers, shines a spotlight on elder abuse in the Hunter as well as how we can better protect our loved ones who are growing older.

27 APRIL 2018

Principal, Catherine Henry, comments on the Federal Government’s latest aged-care policy announcement, which falls significantly short of what’s required to address the crisis in the sector.

16 JUNE 2017

Families in the Hunter are welcoming a report by the Australian Law Reform Commission on the negligence of our elderly in aged care facilities.

30 OCTOBER 2016

Vera Crebert was 87 when her family reluctantly decided to place her into an aged care facility.

15 JUNE 2015

Former Newcastle Law Society president Ms Henry, the daughter of former Newcastle City councillor Margaret, said the decision to relocate from Hunter Street to 133 King Street was to accommodate her 27 staff.

20 AUGUST 2020

What we are seeing unfold in Victoria’s residential aged care facilities is a nightmare that could easily happen in other parts of Australia.

07 AUGUST 2020

Families of residents who died at St Basil’s aged care home have welcomed a coronial investigation into what went wrong at the Melbourne facility.

02 AUGUST 2020

Regional NSW based law firm, Catherine Henry Lawyers, is in the running for two prestigious Australian Law Awards.

18 JUNE 2020

The Federal Government needs to do more than extend the Office of the National Rural Health Commissioner to tackle the disproportionately greater number of poor health outcomes experienced by regional patients.

07 MAY 2020

Newcastle aged care advocate and lawyer Catherine Henry says an examination of the spate of coronavirus deaths at Sydney’s Newmarch House “will get lost” unless it is kept separate.

27 NOVEMBER 2019

Newcastle-based law firm, Catherine Henry Lawyers, has appointed Stephen Phillips to the new position of CEO.

30 OCTOBER 2019

The Aged Care Act 1997 needs to be rewritten to improve safety and quality in aged care says the Australian Lawyers Alliance (ALA) ahead of the release of the preliminary report of the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety.

19 AUGUST 2019

Last week’s Brisbane hearings of the Aged Care royal commission highlighted fundamental problems with the regulation of our aged care system.

29 JUNE 2019

Hunter New England Health has paid out more than $69 million in taxpayer funds for medical mistakes in the past two years, but the local health district will not provide details of the claims, despite having done so in the past.

17 MAY 2019

New research by ME Bank suggests that 74 per cent of Australians believe prenuptial agreements are fair and have merit; however, only 18 per cent of married couples have one — despite the risks, particularly for business owners.

4 APRIL 2019

Hunter-based law firm, Catherine Henry Lawyers, is one of the first organisations in Australia to use a new, first of its kind, tool-kit designed to help the nation’s lawyers better identify and combat the growing problem of elder abuse.

5 MARCH 2019

Gender equality is necessary, says Newcastle Lawyer Catherine Henry on the eve of International Women’s Day.

7 DECEMBER 2018

Australia is “at least” 10 years behind the US when it comes to protecting and upholding the rights of vulnerable senior citizens, but the Newcastle community is banding together to take an interdisciplinary approach to resolve the problems, Kim Boettcher says.

 9 MAY 2018

Catherine Henry fears clinical standards are worsening, with mandated staff-to-patient ratios the only way to tackle the “woefully inadequate staffing arrangements” operating within the industry.

2 FEBRUARY 2018

The principal of a law firm specialising in medical law, Catherine Henry, said she first raised the issue a decade ago in a legal journal after seeing clients whose cancers had been mismanaged.

13 SEPTEMBER 2016

What should have been a medical negligence case then escalated into a “landmark case about the legal status of abortion”, in which the Catholic Church intervened.

21 NOVEMBER 2013

Doctors could easily decide that it’s just not worth the risk to carry out abortions at all, given the ever-present possibility that they could be charged with a criminal offence.

28 OCTOBER 2013

What can be done to reduce the incidence of death and inadequate treatment of the frail elderly in our community?

25 JULY 2020

A third of Covid-19 deaths in Australia so far have occurred in aged-care homes. An investigation finds an underfunded and underprepared sector.

04 JUNE 2020

A coronial investigation into the COVID-19 deaths at Newmarch House is welcome as it should provide the opportunity for much needed scrutiny of the issues that led to the tragedy, says the Australian Lawyers Alliance (ALA).

21 FEBRUARY 2020

In times of grief, the Port’s libraries often become a refuge to those trying to navigate what comes after losing a loved one and librarians become sounding boards when the overwhelming flow of information on end of life matters becomes too much.

04 DECEMBER 2019

Aged care providers that fail to provide quality care should be fined, and residents who are neglected should be given compensation, a specialist aged care lawyer has said.

28 NOVEMBER 2019

Aged care facilities should be held accountable by an independent complaints tribunal, said the Australian Lawyers Alliance.

29 NOVEMBER 2019

Managers and boards of residential aged care facilities should be held personally accountable when standards are not met, a leading Hunter legal expert on aged care issues has told a royal commission.

27 NOVEMBER 2019

The introduction of an independent tribunal to hear complaints of substandard care and with the power to issue fines and order monetary compensation would help hold the aged care sector to account, said the Australian Lawyers Alliance today at the Aged Care Royal Commission public consultation session in Newcastle.

31 AUGUST 2019

Solicitor Erin Woodward from Catherine Henry Lawyers said the case of Dr Hollenbach and others highlighted the lack of transparency about doctors’ histories and “problems with protections available for the public”.

1 SEPTEMBER 2019

Special Counsel and Head of the firm’s family law team, Alan Wright, has completed qualifications to be a professional member of the Resolution Institute and is accredited under the National Mediation Accreditation System.

01 NOVEMBER 2019

The interim report from the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety – entitled Neglect – has rightly labelled our aged care system as “a sad and shocking system that diminishes Australia as a nation”.

9 SEPTEMBER 2019

When Newcastle solicitor Tom Hunter-Leahy became a father for the second time in June, he received two weeks’ full pay in paternity leave.

18 JUNE 2019

Newcastle lawyer Catherine Henry has been recognised at the Newcastle Business Club’s 2019 awards.

12 JUNE 2019

Catherine Henry Lawyers is expanding its award-winning health law service to better serve people in the Hunter and other parts of regional NSW to seek justice or compensation from rogue doctors and other instances of poor health care.

25 MARCH 2019

The recently released Identifying & Acting on Elder Abuse: A Toolkit for Legal Practitioners covers lawyers’ ethical responsibilities which includes duties of confidentiality & discusses screening techniques & checklists to help practitioners in raising the topic with their older clients.

Catherine Henry Lawyers is committed to raising awareness of this issue and assisting clients at risk of experiencing abuse.

13 FEBRUARY 2019

Hunter Headline reports: although Principal, Catherine Henry has built a name locally in the legal industry for much longer than a decade, Catherine Henry Lawyers has celebrated a significant milestone of 10 years serving people in Newcastle and regional NSW.

19 OCTOBER 2018

Abortion laws in NSW need to be brought into the 21^st century, Catherine Henry says to The Newcastle Herald.

9 MAY 2018

Newcastle specialist health and elder care lawyer Catherine Henry says the budget had not tackled  key issues for aged care residents, leaving Australians in aged care facilities unable received appropriate care

16 JUNE 2017

A leading Newcastle lawyer has urged the federal government to “be brave” and adopt the recommendations of a landmark report into the financial and physical abuse of the elderly.

15 FEBRUARY 2016

Newcastle health litigation solicitor Catherine Henry said she had been instructed by two of the families to investigate the viability of negligence claims against the aged care facility.

7 NOVEMBER 2013

Solicitor Catherine Henry says the alleged recent poisoning deaths of two residents at the Summitcare nursing home has highlighted her concerns about the ineffective complaints system.