Join the Community Care Lawyers Group (CCLG)
The Access Social Care Career Pathways report 2022, funded by the Legal Education Foundation (LEF), highlighted the difficulties within Community Care law in recent years, particularly within Legal Aid practice.
Across the sector there are significant difficulties with the financial and practical sustainability of the work, with recruitment and retention of junior staff, as well as issues with retaining and recruiting experienced staff as supervisors.
This has led to Access Social Care and a Working Group of lawyers coming together to create the Community Care Lawyers Group (CCLG).
The group aim to tackle the recruitment crisis in Community Care law and encourage students to work in this exciting and challenging area of law.
We also want to build a build a thriving Community of Practice to provide support to existing Community Care lawyers, somewhere they can discuss Cases, get training and swap expertise with each other.
Future meetings will include talks from experts in the field, seminars and relevant training to help broaden knowledge within the field.
Credit: Legal Action Group 2024
Credit: Legal Action Group 2024
The group has already had some significant achievements. Notably, ASC and the Working Group has:
Successfully argued that Community Care must be included as a specific, identifiable, category in the [previous] Government’s Review of Civil Legal Aid (RoCLA)
Made written submissions to the Ministry of Justice Legal Aid Contracts Review via the Law Society
Run a series of well-attended training sessions about the use of Investigative Representation Legal Aid funding
Appeared in the December 2024 edition of the Legal Action Group (LAG) magazine with this article ‘Adapt and Survive’.
If you would like to know more or are interested in getting involved at all, then please do not hesitate to contact us for more information.
Caroline Miles – Career Pathways Project Manager
caroline.miles@accesscharity.org.uk
James Coppard – Career Pathways Project Officer
james.coppard@accesscharity.org.uk
Photo credits: Legal Action Group 2024