Community Advice and Technical Support Queen Mary’s College London – A Much Needed Community Service
Local advice offices, providing free-toaccess advice to all, have been hit by the loss of legal aid contracts and up to 80% cuts in local authority funding. At the same time, the need for assistance with problems in areas such as debt, housing and welfare benefits is rising dramatically. Whilst these changes have allowed many agencies to increase the number of clients they reach, there has been a reduction in face-to-face advice and specialist support. In particular, services cannot meet the high and growing demand for help with complex welfare benefit problems. Law student placements and partnerships with university law schools can help meet demand for advice whilst enhancing student skills and employability. However, such projects require advice services to be able to provide appropriate supervisory support. Our success as the Queen Mary Legal Advice Centre (LAC) has been recognised by a number of distinguished awards. In 2019: • We were awarded the Principles Prize in the Teaching and Excellence Awards.
Queen Mary Legal Advice Centre website Twitter @QMLAC Facebook QMULLegalAdviceCentre Queen Mary Legal Advice Centre Queen Mary University of London 327 Mile End Road London E1 4NS lac.qmul.ac.uk 020 7882 3931 lac@qmul.ac.uk
• We received the Richard Garriott Public Engagement Award. • We were selected as the QMUL representative for the Collaborative Award for Teaching Excellence (CATE). • Our activities as the Legal Advice Centre contributed to the wider School of Law winning The Best Contribution by a Law School at the annual LawWorks and Attorney General Student Awards
• In 2018, we were honoured to be invited to the Houses of Parliament when we were nominated for the best contribution by a law school in the LawWorks and Attorney General Student Pro Bono Awards. A Free Legal Advice Clinic (LAC) The Queen Mary Legal Advice Centre is committed to providing free legal advice services for members of the public and Queen Mary staff and students, whilst meeting the educational needs of our students. We aim to comply with the professional standards applicable to the legal profession. We are not regulated by the Law Society of England and Wales and do not hold ourselves out to be a solicitor’s practice. We are however a member of LawWorks and are committed to Pro Bono Protocol. Legal Advice Sessions • Advice is delivered by LAC Student Legal Advisers under the supervision of qualified lawyers. If you have an advice session with us you will: • Attend an appointment with two LAC Student Legal Advisers and a qualified lawyer. • Receive free written advice within fourteen days. The aim of the appointment is for us to understand your legal issues and to gather information, we do not provide legal advice during the appointment. Once we have considered your issue we ensure that any legal advice we provide is checked by a qualified lawyer. Then we will advise you on your legal position and what steps to take next.
We do not undertake casework or represent clients in the courts or at tribunals, but we can refer you to other free legal advice providers who are able to offer representation. You will need to visit a legal advice centre (such as ours) to get this referral. As one client put it quite succinctly, “anything free today is rare, excellent legal advice for free is unheard of – but you get this from the Legal Advice Clinic at Queen Marys” How to book an appointment: by email and/or telephone. Your enquiry will be assessed to see whether we can help you. If your case is accepted we will arrange an appointment for you to visit the Legal Advice Centre. You will need to bring any documents relating to your legal issue with you to your appointment. If you are not based in London we can offer Skype and telephone interviews. The Legal Advice Centre is only open for appointments during term-time (October to May), we do not offer a drop-in advice service or provide advice by telephone. We aim to respond within three working days, but during times of high demand, this may take a little longer. We will always reply to your email or return your call.
Collaborate: a community led initiative 27
