Legal help
One of PILA's objectives is to create sustainable ways of matching expertise in the legal profession with legal need community organisations and NGOs and their service users have. We see working with organisations to assess that legal need as the best way to ascertain the most pressing legal issues and give organisations the legal help they require. PILA hopes to work in partnership with them to identify ways in which organisations can use the law in a way that fits with their aims and current strategies.
To achieve the above objective PILA has created a lawyers' register which offers legal assistance pro bono (free of charge) to organisations and their service users. PILA operates a pro bono referral system matching the legal need with the legal expertise on the register. PILA's lawyers' register will complement the work of many lawyers who are already doing pro bono work and will hopefully make law more available to NGOs and community organisations.
The work undertaken by PILA's lawyers' register will be assessed by PILA's aim "to facilitate and promote the use of the law in the public interest for the advancement and protection of human rights for the benefit of marginalised and disadvantaged people". The work therefore must advance the organisation's work in the public interest.