Walk for Access to Justice
Published 11/04/2017
(Author: Laura Cassidy, Fundraising and Development Manager at the Access to Justice Foundation) Find out about the sponsored legal walks happening around the country and how you can get involved. Organised by Legal Support Trusts around the country, legal walks raise funds for free legal advice charities. If you are a charity that offers free legal advice or offers support to litigants in person (e.g PSU), you can 100% fundraise for your organisation.
What is a legal walk?
Each year thousands of legal professionals – solicitors, barristers, chartered legal executives (CILEx lawyers) and many others, along with friends and colleagues take part in legal walks across England and Wales. Although each legal walk varies in size and location, most are between 5 & 10 kilometres and raise vital funds for free legal advice centres around the UK.
The first London Legal Walk, organised by the London Legal Support Trust, took place in 2005, involved 330 walkers and raised £37,000. Since then the iconic event has grown each year, with 2016’s London Legal Walk involving over 10,000 people and raising over £740,000.
The idea of legal walks to raise funds for local advice agencies has spread throughout England and Wales where there are now more than 40 walks each year, and walks have also started in Scotland and even Australia. In 2016, the regional Legal Support Trusts’ walks (outside London and the South East) raised over £158,000; this year we hope to raise even more!
What does the walk raise money for?
The money raised supports free legal advice centres local to the region of the walk who help people with problems to do with housing, immigration, care, benefits and employment.
Access to legal advice makes an enormous difference to people’s lives, reducing poverty and suffering. Successive cuts in public funding for free legal help have had a huge impact on the most vulnerable in society and whilst we cannot seek to fill the gap left by these cuts, helping vulnerable people must be a priority.
If you are a
Who can join the walks?
Most walkers attend in teams from their firms, chambers, courts, in-house teams and law schools and it is very easy to register a team.
However, you do not need to be a legal professional to get involved with a legal walk, anybody is welcome to join the walk as long as they are fit and healthy enough to do so.
There is no minimum or maximum for a team and registration is free.
How can you get involved?
Click here to view the dates of this year legal walks and other events happening around the UK.
Or click on your nearest Legal Support Trust to find out more about walks near you:
Reaching Justice Wales
The Eastern Legal Support Trust
The London Legal Support Trust
The Midlands Legal Support Trust
The North East Legal Support Trust
The North West Legal Support Trust
The South West Legal Support Trust
The Yorkshire Legal Support Trust
