If this is your first visit, check out the community guide. You will have to Join us or Sign in before you can post.
Have your say about your online community! Complete our annual survey.
My hearing
I need an advisor and someone to come to court with me but i don't know where to go for one in hull
Replies
Man is the only animal that blushes, or needs to!
To give you an example the nearest CLC in the South East is in West London. So you can imagine the number of claimants in Kent alone going to one centre some 90 miles away!
As for a Law School. Students do not specialise at that stage. The only hope you have would come from one the lecturers. Obviously they would do this in their spare time (outside teaching). Consequently and like the Community Law Centres there is obviously a limit to the number of claimants that they can help.
I would agree that the likes of the CAB, AgeUK and other charitable organisations are not geared up to give that one to one service. If they were they would not have the time to give the many 1,000's still in the queue wanting the same attention.
AgeUK for example will only offer advice and hand out a leaflet. They will help fill out forms, but again that can be hit or miss depending on the quality, experience etc of the advisor.
There is another option, Google local solicitors who offer Pro Bono representation. A long shot, I know, but there are some very nice solicitors, with a social conscience.
Man is the only animal that blushes, or needs to!
Try finding "your local " anything.
Handy man. Solicitor = rose coloured glasses??
As for Kent University (in Canterbury - about 2 miles from where I live) one of their lecturers represented me at a tribunal years ago in a dispute about the correct level of Council Tax benefit I should have been receiving. It was brilliant having him next to me. I hardly said a word and came out £3000 better off!!
So with PIP in 2013 that was first port of call only to be told that they no longer deal with benefit issues involving local people. All of their time is now spent dealing with asylum claims and defending cases of people being ejected out of this country. Locally we have a very large detention centre where the 'residents' need professional free legal representation.
Yes students do get involved and do shadow cases - I had one for the above tribunal. But they do not get involved professionally on their own with the claimant.
I have yet to find a practicing solicitor have a social conscience around here. In fact my son in law is a practicing solicitor who lives locally but unfortunately cannot help as welfare benefits is not one of the subjects he knows much about.
With reference to Yadnad's response to my post re University Schools of Law The answer was not necessarily relevant to your situation, but a general comment in response to a post by another member of the forum.
I’ve equally no idea why threads like this never mention this most obvious of options.
Need to be clear about advice from law schools. They’re not affiliated to any national advice groups and some areas have used their existence to replace properly funded advice and representation. There are sound ideological reasons for not encouraging that at all. A law student as a Mackenzie friend is no more use than a well meaning friend. They will have zero knowledge of social security law; usually don’t have up to date resources and nil knowledge of the appropriate procedures. The numbers which do this are few so it’s hardly worth mentioning but it should be opppsed in my personal view.
I have no idea where you live, but access to 'properly funded advice centres' is not universal across the country. Properly funded? By whom? Local Authorities are cutting back on anything they deem unnecessary.. (Take a look at Nottingham) CAB, I would not call their expertise Universal. Read some of the comments on this forum. TUC Centre? If you live in a rural part of the country you have about as much chance of finding a TUC Centre as finding 'Gold in them there hills.'
When I suggested contacting University Law School, I made it clear, FINAL YEAR STUDENTS. I also mentioned that, from my experience and others, that some students actually shadow solicitors when they attend Tribunals, training for the day when they qualify. A McKenzie friend does not have to be legally trained, agreed. However, talking to and receiving advice from someone who has an interest in the law (A Law Student) and having access to a lot more information in relation to the intricacies of the various Social Security Acts, than the man in the street, must be of some value. They may even be able to steer the person seeking advice towards a solicitor, who may offer Pro Bono advice.
When a man is drowning, he will clutch at straws.
Then are you suggesting someone who is in uni studying law as opposed to someone who already has a degree in law and is now on the next step of the ladder to becoming a qualified solicitor as a student of law at a law college?
If you are actually referring to those who are/were studying law towards a law degree, my daughter has an A level in Law (which she has never used) and my granddaughter graduated from Liverpool Uni last year with a degree in law (and now works as a carer of severely disabled children).
Neither have the first inkling in welfare law beyond the basics. It's when they become final year students at Law College in order to qualify, purely from an academic point of view, that they may well be able to offer advice.
A Mackenzie friend is deomonstrably statistically no more use than a friend regardless of knowledge levels. Amusingly it’s years of academic research which back that up. It improves your chances of winning to simply have anyone attend. They don’t necessarily have access to any relevant resources at all either whether final year or not and it’s simply a leap to suggest that they “must be of some value”. There’s simply no evidence for it at all.
OT but the same sadly applies to your signature. It’s a Mark Twain quote and it’s incorrect. There is a dog which blushes and numerous animals which demonstrate embarrassment in a variety of ways
US humorist, novelist, short story author, & wit (1835 - 1910)
For the record @Peasmold_01 quotation of the said Twain is correct.
Therefore the quotation of @mikehughescq, is incorrect.
I would add, "sarcasm is the lowest form of wit" - Oscar Wilde.
Enjoy your day.
We want the community to be a safe and supportive place. Please make sure your messages respect other users’ views and suggestions, even if you don’t agree with them.
Take care to present your views tactfully and remember that humour may be misinterpreted.
Er, thanks @atlas46 but I didn't say the quoting of Mark Twain was incorrect.
I said that what the quote claims is incorrect. Thus the subsequent sentence "There is a dog which blushes and numerous animals which demonstrate embarrassment in a variety of ways." No sarcasm intended. Just a factual correction done with an explanation as to why.
Perhaps you'd like to update everyone on your complaint to my employer?