About

For 25 years, Cate Sumner has worked in the Middle East, Asia and the Pacific, focusing on access to justice, legal identity, human rights and judicial reform. Her career spans work with the international law firm Baker & McKenzie in Cairo, the United Nations (as a Refugee Affairs Officer in the Gaza Strip and as Legal Officer in Jerusalem,), Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and the International Development Law Organisation in their offices in Manila and Sydney. Cate established Law & Development Partners in 2005 to bring together law and development specialists working in Asia and the Pacific. Its focus is on improving access to justice for women, people with a disability, and vulnerable children. A particular focus has been how these groups are able to access the formal justice system and civil registration systems. Cate has worked in Indonesia since 2005 as an adviser on access to justice and legal identity programmes and has contributed analytical and policy papers to a range of international organisations and policy think- tanks ranging from UN Women, the World Bank Justice for the Poor Series, the Centre for Global Development and the Lowy Institute for International Policy. 

In 2019 Cate was awarded a Churchill Trust Fellowship to explore how private finance, philanthropic donors and government can collaborate to provide free legal services for women and children through a Health Justice Partnership for Tasmania.