GMLC campaign volunteer Katherine Brown reports from GMLC’s event ‘Mind the Gap’ on Thursday 19 May, held at Thompsons Solicitors.
On Thursday 19 May, Greater Manchester Law Centre (GMLC) and Thompsons Solicitors hosted ‘Mind the Gap: Access to Justice in the North West’, an event which focused on how we can support individuals and communities across Greater Manchester and beyond with accessing legal advice. This event invited members of the public and also those from charities and legal organisations to listen to the speakers and ask them questions.
Around 80 attendees heard from four speakers, and each one was able to shed new light on the problems which have developed over the last decade with getting access to justice.
Rebecca Long-Bailey MP gave a rousing speech on the limited resources which are available to her constituents, and highlighted the gap between the lack of aid which is available to people in the North West compared to other areas in the country, such as London. She brought up some shocking statistics – 49% of residents in the North West live within local authorities without any access to legal aid providers, whereas in London that figure is 3%. Long-Bailey also mentioned that solicitors are being forced away from legal aid work due to it no longer being financially viable. Since 2012, the number of criminal legal aid providers has dropped by 525, which really demonstrates just how much legal aid has been affected in the last 10 years with the government’s austerity agenda.
We next heard from Sue James, CEO of Legal Action Group, a charity which focuses on widening access to justice. Sue James focused on the long term affects that the Covid-19 pandemic has had on creating even wider inequalities – not just in health, but also socio-economic areas – and how that has then impacted certain communities’ access to free legal advice.
We were joined virtually by three members from the Long Covid Group. They outlined what issues one may suffer from with Long Covid, such as difficulty reading and processing information. Similarly to the speakers that came before, they linked the issues that have arisen from the Covid-19 pandemic to the growing inequalities across the country and how that leads to increasing issues with getting access to legal aid and advice, as well as difficulty obtaining disability-related benefits.
Jason Tetley, Director of the Greater Manchester Law Centre, closed the speeches. He described the difficulties people who are more disenfranchised face with getting access to justice, with a growing number of litigants-in-person across the family and civil courts. With the 6,138 litigants-in-person that GMLC have advised over the past 18 months as part of GMLC’s LIP project, 40% had underlying health conditions and 70% of them were on poverty-level incomes, amongst countless other issues we try to overcome such as language barriers, difficulty reading and writing, and digital illiteracy.
One thing that came from this event was clear: legal aid should be a fundamental universal right for everyone, but right now it is being rationed. It is the idea that legal aid is a luxury that has led to cuts and ‘legal deserts’ being created across legal areas. Attendees at the event at Thompsons were able to gain an invaluable insight from those who have seen from the frontline what affect these cuts have on local communities, or from those who have experienced it themselves first-hand.
GMLC aim to collectivise some of the responses they received from the event, and use the available resources to enhance advice where possible. What is needed is strategic change, and this can begin by collectively upskilling those disadvantaged communities to make them aware of their rights and how they can challenge injustice using the law, and linking up provision so the available capacity is used. The event uncovered painful truths from the past decade in how legal aid has suffered, but looked towards the possibility of a brighter future in which equal access to justice can be achieved.
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GMLC would like to build better partnership networks of advice and representation in the North West. If you or your organisation can offer pro bono advice or referral pathways with GMLC, please get in touch with us at reception@gmlaw.org.uk to start the conversation.
To join our fight for access to justice, you can become a member and sponsor of GMLC: sign up on our website here. Businesses, trusts and foundations can find information about donations and grants to GMLC here. You can affiliate your organisation or trade union branch here.
To get involved with GMLC as a volunteer, please email development@gmlaw.org.uk with your CV and let us know whether you are interested in campaign or service volunteering. Volunteers are the backbone of the Law Centre.
Photo credit: Rae Allen, Flickr, 2014 and Google Maps.
