Reductions in Legal Aid for Migrants and Local Authority Support to People with No Recourse to Public Funds
Wednesday 27th March 2013; 9.15am – 4:30pm
Islington Town Hall, London
This event is free of charge.
Programme
09.15 – 09.45: Registration, Tea/Coffee
10.00 – 10.45: Welcome and introduction
11:00 – 11.15: Coffee break
11.15 – 12.30: Workshop 1
12.30 – 12.45: Feedback from workshops
12.45 – 13.45: Lunch and networking
13:45 – 14:30: Keynote speaker
14.30 – 14.45: Coffee break
14.45 – 16.00: Workshop 2
16:00 – 16.15: Feedback from workshops
16:15 – 16:30: Summing up
The event will include presentations from the Ministry of Justice, Coram Children’s Legal Centre, the Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association, Islington Law Centre, the British Red Cross and the NRPF Network amongst others. More details will follow in due course.
Outline Purpose
This conference will bring together representatives of local authorities, central government and the voluntary sector to reflect on recent reductions in Legal Services Commission funding (legal aid) to migrants and in particular people who have no recourse to public funds.
Reductions to legal aid for immigration and asylum law will come into force in April 2013 according to the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012. In increasingly narrow circumstances, some legal aid will remain available for asylum seekers, asylum support housing cases, domestic violence and trafficking victims (subject to limited definitions in these areas), challenges to immigration detention and judicial review, but migrants will not be able to access legal aid for other immigration cases.
These cuts will have a huge impact on migrants, for example on people seeking to remain in the UK on the basis of Article 8 HRA (right to respect for private and family life), non asylum-seekers resisting removal/deportation, children outside of the asylum process and cases where a person seeks family reunion.
This conference aims to equip attendees with the awareness, planning and ideas needed to navigate these cuts in a way that protects their organisations without putting clients at risk.
Who should attend?
Local authority adult and children’s social services managers
Local authority lawyers
Local and Central government policymakers
Voluntary sector organisations
Immigration law practitioners and legal agencies
This event is funded by the British Red Cross and NRPF Network.
Please visit http://www.nrpfnetwork.org.uk for more details on how to book your place at this event.