The Canadian Bar Association is the professional association many lawyers in Canada belong to. It advocates not only on behalf of lawyers but the people who use or need our legal services.
The CBA has recently taken steps to look at the fact that there is a large proportion of the population who cannot really afford lawyers to go to court for them in civil matters – access to justice is now a critical issue in Canada:
“Inaccessible justice costs us all, but visits its harshest consequences on the poorest people in our communities,” says the report.
Report author Melina Buckley says one of the biggest concerns is the growing number of people who represent themselves in civil cases.
Buckley says many people earn just enough money so they don’t qualify for legal aid, but they also don’t make enough to pay for a lawyer. Those people often find themselves on their own in court, she says. >> Read Article
Lawyers recognize the problem and want to help.
Many of us volunteer regularly for the free but limited legal advice services like Access Pro Bono in B.C. Others offer to unbundle our services so that litigants can get some advice and assistance without having to pay for a lawyer to do all of the work and take all of the court attendances for them.
If you are involved in a divorce, custody or support battle or any other kind of lawsuit, now or in the future, I would encourage you to speak to a lawyer initially to learn about your options and what kind of help you can get for what you can reasonably afford.
Click here to read the full report: Equal Justice – Balancing the Scales