Young People’s Project

The Young People’s Programme’s aim is to make sure that every young person has access to the legal advice they need.

Read our latest report on the impact of legal aid cuts on children and young people.

“I am now going to University in September- all thanks to the advice I received”.

“I think without the Law Centre I would be lost. Now I just live for my baby and do my best.”

“They (the Law Centre) are different from everywhere else because they don’t just shove a form at you and tell you to go away. They spend time with you and you feel they are interested in you.”

“This (partnership with the Law Centre) is the best thing we’ve done as a service – the feedback from young people has been very positive. We were never able to get young people housed before we had the legal advice service …….it provides the solution” [Connexions Personal Advisor]

*

Law Centres know from experience that young people have high unmet needs for legal advice. Youth Access evidence shows that 16–24-year-olds experience at least 2.3 million rights-related problems requiring advice a year. 

The Young People’s Programme working with Law Centres has pioneered groundbreaking legal advice services for young people which are youth focused, high quality, and accessible. Our Rights Within Reach Report, co-written with Youth Access provides a blueprint for these services. Read the report here.

15 London Law Centres now deliver a pan London Youth Homelessness Service and a pan-London Education Advice service, through partnerships with local youth providers and outreach from youth venues.

Young people use legal services when their lives are in transition, when they are homeless, excluded from school, struggling with their asylum/immigration status, living independently for the first time. Our services achieve incredible outcomes for young people, transforming and even saving lives.

Young volunteers conducted Youth Access Outcomes Interviews on a sample of clients across the London Law Centres’ Youth Homelessness Projects.

Young people reported improvements in the following areas of their lives:

  • Housing (76%)
  • Knowledge about where to get help (88%)
  • Levels of stress (70%)
  • Confidence (64%)
  • Health (34%)
  • Money situation (35% )
  • Their behaviour (48%)
  • Involvement in training, education or employment (35%)

    • For more information about Law Centres’ young people’s legal services in your area, please contact Mandy at .

    As well as supporting over 8,000 disadvantaged young people, the Young People’s Project works strategically to bring about change for all children and young people. The Law Centres Federation is a founder member of the JustRights campaign which lobbies for access to justice for all children and young people. The campaign website is available at www.justrights.org.uk. You can also read a recent JustRights briefing as well as a recent roundtable discussion held at the House of Commons.

    The Young People’s Programme has now received funding from the Paul Hamlyn Foundation to expand young people’s legal advice services across the country and by areas of legal advice, as well as rolling out ambitious youth participation plans, including apprenticeships.

    Current and future initiatives

    Service Development

  • National Roll out of Law Centres’ Young People’s Services: We are currently developing projects in Cumbria, Rochdale, Chesterfield, Coventry, Bristol and Surrey. Kirklees, Birmingham, Luton and others will be joining the project in the coming months.
  • Consolidating and expanding Young People’s Services in London: Brent, Harrow and Hammersmith and Fulham Law Centres have joined the group of North, South and East London Law Centres offering targeted specialise advice to young people.
  • Working in partnership with RAD (Royal Association for Deaf People) to support more deaf and hard of hearing young people to access legal services.
  • Developing young people’s discrimination advice services
  • Setting up Law Centres’ youth participation projects
  • Developing young people’s asylum and immigration advice services

    • Strategic Policy Work

  • JustRights Campaign to protect children and young people from the legal aid cuts proposed in the Legal Aid Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill. Following our successful roundtable event in Westminster in July, we published a report with the Law Society in September on the impact of the Bill on children and young people. Read the report here.
  • We have commissioned a report with Youth Access by Professor Pascoe Pleasance; Civil Legal Problems: Young People, Social Exclusion and Crime, forthcoming.
  • We are coordinating partners across the legal, children’s and youth sectors to take joint action to ensure that all homeless 16 and 17 year olds obtain the support they need.

    • For more information please contact .