Free Advice Research Articles

The ACWL: Enhancing the Accessibility of the WTO Legal System

The ACWL was established in 2001 to level the playing field at the WTO by providing assistance in WTO dispute settlement proceedings and free legal advice and training to developing countries and LDCs. More than 20 years after its creation, this article describes the origins of and rationale behind the ACWL and assesses the impact of its services. It also explains the current informal discussions among ACWL Members to improve the accessibility of its services in the context of the broader WTO discussions regarding the dispute settlement system reform. Legal aid, developing countries, LDCs, accessibility, dispute, Settlement, World Trade Organization

Clinical Legal Education as an Instrument to Adress Access to Justice

This report explores the role of clinical legal education in promoting Access to Justice and human rights. Legal clinics have the potential to provide practical skills to law students, sensitizing them to social challenges and Access to Justice issues while offering free legal advice to marginalized individuals. By effectively combining these approaches, legal clinics can contribute significantly to achieving greater Access to Justice. However, German law clinics take up a rather neglected role within German legal education. After highlighting the role of legal clinics within Access to Justice, the report assesses the movement of clinical legal education in Germany, providing a historic overview and discussing the current situation. The report then identifies the main challenges of the German clinical movement such as limited recognition in the academic environment and financial instability. In conclusion, institutional support, and recognition within the educational and academic fields are identified as crucial elements in enhancing Access to Justice through legal clinics in Germany.

A model for direct support of people with rare dementias, their families and practitioners

AbstractRare Dementia Support (RDS) is a UK‐based collaborative service led by the UCL Dementia Research Centre, which aims to empower, guide and inform people living with a rare dementia diagnosis and those who care about them. RDS covers familial Alzheimer’s disease (FAD), frontotemporal dementia (FTD), familial frontotemporal dementia (fFTD), posterior cortical atrophy (PCA), primary progressive aphasia (PPA), Lewy body dementia (LBD) and young‐onset Alzheimer’s disease (YOAD). Following self‐referrals and clinical referrals from memory services and specialist neurology clinics across the UK, we provide one‐to‐one support and facilitate regular opportunities for members to meet each other and the team, through large and small support groups, themed programmes and regional support groups.We will describe the practices of the one‐to‐one Direct Support Team, which provides free information, advice and support from pre‐diagnosis navigation through to post‐bereavement support. This specialist emotional and practical support encompasses compassionate listening; solution focussed outcomes (to complement the diagnosis, treatment and monitoring); helping people to understand and adapt to their condition; empowering people to use their strengths to live fulfilled lives; designing strategies and interventions to manage complex situations (including issues of safeguarding, deprivation of liberty, etc); legal rights and financial support; and supporting transitions into later stages and end of life.We will also relate the practices of direct support to the broader principles of RDS as a whole (see Figure 1), including the implications of never discharging anyone from our service, and balancing person‐centred and disease‐specific approaches (the importance of knowing which disease each person has, and what person the disease has).An evaluation of the service will be presented, including characterisation of the current 4797 members, plus data from individual support consultations in 2022 (N = 1449) relating outcomes to personal (social connectedness, wellbeing, knowledge of condition and services), disease (diagnosis, severity) and service (support usage, intensity of discussion) factors.We will conclude by discussing existing examples of and new opportunities for partnership working – with local, national and international charities, clinical services, academic institutions and funding organisations – to improve access to specialist support for those with atypical, inherited and young onset dementias.

Subsidized veterinary extension services may reduce antimicrobial resistance in aquaculture

Antibiotic use in aquaculture has become very controversial vis-à-vis driving antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in aquatic bacterial populations. The AMR trends in fish pathogens in Hong Kong over a four-year period suggests that providing small stakeholder farmers with free veterinary advice on fish health issues and treatments, as well as subsidized quality-assured medicines, likely reduced AMR. We observed a dramatic reduction in the proportion of bacteria resistant to oxolinic acid, oxytetracycline, and florfenicol on local aquaculture farms between 2018 and 2021. These decreases coincided with either a change in antibiotic use practices on farms (i.e. with oxytetracycline), or the reduction in the use of specific drugs (i.e. oxolinic acid and florfenicol). We did not observe a similar decline in the resistance pattern to commonly used antibiotics in human medicine in the same fish bacteria. Resistance to these products, which were unlikely to be used by the farmers in our study, was very high. Our finding suggests that both human and veterinary use of antibiotics in Hong Kong may have an influence on the AMR of bacteria in the aquatic environment.

State of the Nation: 10 Years of Entrepreneurial Law Clinic Supervision in the United Kingdom

In July 2012, I delivered my first conference paper at the International Journal of Clinical Legal Education Conference: ‘Taking care of business: a new clinician’s experience of supervising and developing commercial case work.’ The audience was sparse. When the chair asked for questions, the room echoed in silence. A few years later, I was called a ‘danger’ to clinical legal education because my students provided free advice to entrepreneurs. The service was criticised as being at odds with the social justice mission of clinical legal education. I remember it being a lonely time. Only a handful of UK entrepreneurial law clinics existed, and we received little attention in research literature. A decade on, I am still taking care of the Business and Commercial Law Clinic at Northumbria Law School. Much has changed. We have seen the rapid development of commercially focused law clinics across the UK, with a diverse range of approaches. In this article I will make a major contribution to our understanding of the state of the nation for entrepreneurial law clinics in the United Kingdom today. Using elements of narrative inquiry and autobiographical writing, I will (a) reflect on my journey as one of the first UK entrepreneurial law clinic supervisors, (b) report on the increasing number and models of law clinics offering advice to businesses, and (c) argue for the further development of research in this distinctive and flourishing area of clinical practice.

Conspiracy believers claim to be free thinkers but (Under)Use advice like everyone else.

Conspiracy believers often claim to be critical thinkers their 'own research' instead of relying on others' testimony. In two preregistered behavioural studies conducted in the United Kingdom and Pakistan (Nparticipants = 864, Ntrials = 5408), we test whether conspiracy believers have a general tendency to discount social information (in favour of their own opinions and intuitions). We found that conspiracy mentality is not associated with social information use in text-based (Study 1) and image-based (Study 2) advice-taking tasks. Yet, we found discrepancies between self-reported and actual social information use. Conspiracy believers were more likely to report relying less on social information than actually relying less on social information in the behavioural tasks. Our results suggest that the scepticism of conspiracy believers towards epistemic authorities is unlikely to be the manifestation of a general tendency to discount social information. Conspiracy believers may be more permeable to social influence than they sometimes claim.

Struggling to improve farm biosecurity: Do free advice and subsidies hit the target?

Biosafety measures (BSMs) often aim at reducing the likelihood of cross-species interactions at the wildlife-livestock interface. Examples include means to segregate wild ungulates from cattle at waterholes or at feeders. Subsidies or incentives for BSM implementation are expected to contribute to improved BSM acceptance. However, several recent experiences led us to write a cautionary commentary on the variable success of incentives in farm biosafety promotion. We list examples where, after offering farm-specific biosecurity action plans for free or subsidizing 100% of the cost of a given BSM, 25–40% of the farmers remained unwilling to invest efforts in farm biosafety and BSM maintenance. We suggest seeking a better understanding of farmers’ motivations through social science research, to train farm veterinarians on biosecurity and on how to tailor biosafety communication, and to set up formal regional risk mitigation programs including financial, logistical, and educational assistance, as well as monitoring plans, through public-private collaboration.

Health economics of health justice partnerships: A rapid review of the economic returns to society of promoting access to legal advice.

Welfare legal problems and inadequate access to support services follow both the socioeconomic and the health inequalities gradients. Health Justice Partnership (HJP) is an international practitioner-led movement which brings together legal and healthcare professionals to address the root causes of ill health from negative social determinants. The aim of this paper was to identify the current evidence base for the cost-effectiveness of HJP or comparable welfare advice services. A rapid review format was used, with a literature search of PubMed, CINAHL, ASSIA, PsycINFO, Medline, Cochrane Library, Global Health and Web of Science identifying 496 articles. After removal of duplicates, 176 papers were screened on titles and abstracts, and 20 papers met the eligibility criteria. Following a full-text screening, a further 14 papers were excluded due to lack of economic evaluations. Excluded papers' reference lists were scanned, with a further 3 further papers identified which met the inclusion criteria. A final pool of nine studies were included in this review. Studies focused on the financial benefit to service users, with only three studies reporting on cost effectiveness of the interventions. Only one study reported on the economic impact of change of health in service users and one study reported on changes in health service use. This review highlights the current evidence gap in evaluating the cost-effectiveness of adequate access to free legal welfare advice and representation. We propose that an interdisciplinary research agenda between health economics and legal-health services is required to address this research gap.

Locating the informed publics

Daniel Joyce’s book is more than a publication. It is a testimony to courage. When he started this book project, I had a few brief chats with the author. He harboured doubts, as some experienced scholars in the field had given him free advice: do not take up such a vague and undefined topic. International law is about sources and rules and their application; not about media and public communication. The author wisely decided to ignore this free advice, to follow his own intuition and curiosity instead. The result is the topic of this symposium: Informed Publics, Media and International Law, a remarkable and important book. The book also shows that Joyce’s premature critics suffer from lack of knowledge of the history of the discipline. What may sound like a hip, twenty-first century topic, was actually already discussed extensively in 1907, with the launch of the very first issue of the American Journal of International Law. Joyce’s book discusses how Elihu Root opened that issue with an editorial discussing the need for an enlightened public, one that is morally and legally educated about its rights and entitlements.1 The book traces the attention to the notion of public opinion in the discipline since then, pointing, for example, to Hersch Lauterpacht’s belief in a well-informed public opinion as a source of legitimacy and effectiveness in international law.2 The book could even have gone back much further in history, pointing at the ‘right to communicate’ which underpinned Francesco de Vitoria’s natural law foundations of international law. The rise of international law is, after all, closely tied to colonial expansion and the corresponding imperatives to travel, trade and communicate.3 In any case, the book makes a clear point: publics, communication and media have always been a central topic for international lawyers (and for good reason). What has changed of course are the particular forms through which information and communication are mediated. Since ‘the media is the message’, it is essential to keep updating how international law is mediated and how international law defines and seeks to regulate the media. Because of this, Joyce’s book is a welcome and original contribution to the field. It is also a book that fits within a longer tradition in international law. This is not only true for the very topic (media and international law), but also for the main concern expressed in the book: how to facilitate informed, enlightened publics?

Tax Lawyers, Tax Defiance, and the Ethics of Casual Conversation

Each profession entails a risk for a different kind of casual conversation its members must endure. Medical doctors probably endure casual conversations about pains and rashes, second guesses of primary care physicians, and disorganized thoughts about health care reform, prescription drugs, vitamin C, and chelation. Pastors, priests, and rabbis probably endure unbridled enthusiasm for ecumenical dialogue and experience. Lawyers listen to horror stories of divorce and custody battles, disorganized thoughts on tort reform, and, of course, lawyer jokes, most of which are not new, few of which are funny, and none of which are clever. Specialists within each profession suffer with specific conversations. The psychiatrist and the dermatologist risk different conversations, as do the tax lawyer and the criminal defense lawyer. The conversational risks of tax lawyers are fairly predictable. First are those conversations premised on confusing us with accountants, usually beginning with an inquiry as to our annual April 15th-related workload. Second are political conversations, usually about tax rates—especially those on capital gains, corporations, and estates. Some while back, the conversation was likely to begin with the wonders of the so-called flat tax, and no doubt the flat tax proposals will circle back again in our casual conversations. (Recently a medical doctor engaged me on the wonders of the flat tax, and given his conversation ensued during a medical procedure, I found myself more enamored with the proposal than ever before.) Perhaps the most common political tax topic at the moment is the income tax burden borne at the top and the income tax ease enjoyed on the bottom. The third common casual conversation topic for tax lawyers has to do with tax gimmicks and, especially, rumors of tax gimmicks. With this kind of conversation, tax lawyers are fairly skilled in conversational evasiveness, worrying about unintentionally forming an attorney-client relationship. Our fears related to this kind of conversant are not merely avoiding ethical issues or providing undeserved free legal advice but more so avoiding inviting him or her into a professional relationship. Clients interested in the latest tax gimmicks must be avoided, and those willing to chat-up strangers about tax advice are especially to be avoided.

Maximising the health impacts of free advice services in the UK: A mixed methods systematic review.

After a decade of austerity spending cuts and welfare reform, the COVID‐19 pandemic has posed further challenges to the finances, health and wellbeing of working‐age, low‐income people. While advice services have been widely seen (and funded) as an income maximisation intervention, their health and well‐being impact is less clear. Previous systematic reviews investigating the link between advice services and health outcomes have found a weak evidence base and cover the period up until 2010. This mixed methods review examined up to date evidence to help understand the health impacts of free and independent welfare rights advice services. We included evaluations of free to access advice services on social welfare issues for members of the public that included health outcomes. Through comprehensive searches of two bibliographic databases and websites of relevant organisations we identified 15 articles based on a mixture of study designs. The advice interventions evaluated were based in a range of settings and only limited information was available on the delivery and nature of advice offered. We undertook a convergent synthesis to analyse data on the effectiveness of advice services on health outcomes and to explain variation in these outcomes. Our synthesis suggested that improvements in mental health and well‐being measures are commonly attributed to advice service interventions. However, there is little insight to explain these impacts or to inform the delivery of services that maximise health benefits. Co‐locating services in health settings appears promising and embracing models of delivery that promote collaboration between organisations tackling the social determinants of health may help to address the inherent complexities in the delivery of advice services and client needs. We make recommendations to improve routine monitoring and reporting by advice services, and methods of evaluation that will better account for complexity and context.

(Un)willingness to contribute financially towards advice surrounding diffuse water pollution: the perspectives of farmers and advisors

Purpose: This study explores whether farmers across England believe that advice on diffuse water pollution from agriculture (DWPA) which is currently provided for free at the point of delivery is credible, relevant, and legitimate (‘CRELE’) enough to justify paying towards. Methodology: A mixed-methods study consisting of an online questionnaire survey (n = 225) and telephone interviews of farmers (n = 60) and farm advisors (n = 50) was conducted. Findings: Across all methods (n = 330), 63.3% of participants (n = 208) responded negatively to the prospect of paying towards DWPA advice, with just 10% expressing a clear willingness to contribute. The main negative themes related to categorical unwillingness, financial constraints, the presence of alternative sources of advice, the accountability of farmers, and exclusion risk. Factors which may increase willingness included the delivery of high quality, farm-salient advice, or where compliance requires engagement. Practical implications: This paper concludes that governments should continue to provide free advice on DWPA if water quality goals are to be met. Originality/value: This is the first known European study which explores farmer willingness to pay towards advice for DWPA. Theoretical implications: The use of the ‘CRELE’ framework is novel as it is typically used to explore science-policy interfaces.

Reducing Dog Relinquishment to Rescue Centres Due to Behaviour Problems: Identifying Cases to Target with an Advice Intervention at the Point of Relinquishment Request.

Simple SummaryAnnually, thousands of dogs are relinquished to rescue centres globally. Dog owners report that a leading cause for relinquishment are their dogs’ behavioural problems. Efforts are needed to reduce dog relinquishment, by enabling dog owners to feel comfortable and confident with having them in their home. Free behavioural advice was offered to 1131 dog owners at the time of them calling to relinquish their dog to animal welfare charity. Behavioural advice was accepted by 24.4% of the dog owners calling to relinquish their dogs. The advice was accepted almost six times more often by owners with dogs with general management behaviour problems, compared to owners who had problems with aggression between dogs in their home. Offering free behavioural advice reduced the number of dog relinquishments. Consequently, the stress associated with maintaining a dog in sheltered conditions and rehoming them, and the trauma for the owner was eliminated in a quarter of cases. Moving forward, additional strategies are needed to enable more owners to keep their dogs in their homes and reduce relinquishment.Behaviour problems are a leading reason for dogs being relinquished to rescue centres across the world every year. The aim of this study was to investigate whether free behavioural advice would be accepted at the point of an owner requesting to relinquish their dog for behavioural reasons. The call records of 1131 relinquishment requests were reviewed and analysed to establish if the offer of free behaviour advice was accepted. The results showed that advice was accepted in 24.4% of relinquishment requests and behavioural problem was a significant predictor of whether advice was accepted (p < 0.001). The odds of advice being accepted were 5.755 times (95% CI: 2.835–11.681; p < 0.001) greater for a relinquishment request due to problems with general management behaviours compared to aggression between dogs in the home, representing 4.2% and 20.2% of overall relinquishment requests. These data suggest that owners are prepared to accept behaviour advice at the point of relinquishment request, so advice interventions could have potential to impact the levels of dog relinquishment to rescue centres. The impact of an intervention offering behaviour advice may be limited by overall levels of advice acceptance by owners and therefore complimentary proactive solutions to reduce behavioural relinquishments should also be considered.

The Relation Between Direct Social Action and Repoliticisation: The Case of the New Case del Popolo in South Italy

This contribution aims to analyse the political effects of direct social action through the case of Potere al Popolo, a young radical left movement born in Italy. The strategy of this movement is based on a network of Case del Popolo where activists participate in direct social action such as free legal advice, alternative cultural activities or food distribution. Focusing our research on South Italy, this form of collective action will be analysed through the concepts of the actionalist theory. This will allow us to understand to what extent these new Case del Popolo can act as hubs for repoliticisation. The data used in this article are based on a qualitative method including interviews in the sites under investigation, a participant observation and the analysis of the communication of the political movement.

Supporting Access to Justice Through Volunteer Training: An Evaluation of an Open Educational Resource

Declining levels of state provision of free legal advice and representation have led to increased demand for support from legal charities. This study evaluates a co-designed Open Educational Resource providing education and training for support workers volunteering for the UK legal charity Support Through Court. Addressing issues of domestic abuse and related civil law procedures, the resource was primarily designed to meet the training needs of Support Through Court volunteers, but was also aimed to be of use to those dealing with similar issues in related organisations, as well as interested members of the public. This study demonstrates the public engagement potential of co-designed education resources as a form of collaborative enquiry, providing a means for co-created knowledge beneficial to both the university and civil society. An analysis of interviews with key stakeholders has shown different impacts at micro, meso and macro levels. It concludes by offering new avenues for further research into pathways for universities to support access to justice.

‘What about the poor people's rights?’ The dismantling of social citizenship through access to justice and welfare reform policy

AbstractRecent extensive reforms to the welfare system and concurrent reduction in the provision of free legal advice have had a major impact on the meaning of social citizenship. This article examines this changed meaning, drawing mainly on the findings of a study funded by the Equality and Human Rights Commission into the impact of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012. The study provides evidence of the interrelationship between civil and social rights, and of how the changes to legal advice provision have had a negative impact on the ability of citizens to establish or enforce welfare rights. The effect is a perception that the state is failing to uphold its end of a reciprocal bargain with its citizens. We argue that limited reciprocity and inclusion, along with distrust in the system, have profound implications for social and civil rights, undermine the state's political legitimacy, and are causing the dismantling of social citizenship.

A NEXUS BETWEEN HOUSEHOLD CHARACTERISTICS AND WOMEN’S EMPOWERMENT: A CASE STUDY OF PUNJAB, PAKISTAN

Purpose of the study: The empowerment of women is an important aim for them to be fully engaged in economic life and to achieve sustainable growth worldwide. One form of empowerment is to provide women with basic facilities.&#x0D; Methodology: The study also analyzed the impact on women's empowerment by primary data taken via multi-phase cluster sampling methods of household socio-economic and cultural characteristics in Punjab. Given the diversity of nature and context, the 6-dimensional empirical polychoric principles of empowering women generate a stringent cumulative index of women's autonomy.&#x0D; Main Findings: The empirical findings show that empowering women and their six-dimensional effects are positive for women's years and jobs, legal advertisements, health care institutions, social participation, safe, smooth surroundings, communication, politics and residential negative participation, unpaid housekeeping, and the fear of violence. The results show that women's empowerment is positive.&#x0D; Applications of this study: This study can be more effective in the manner that to offer women free advice about their rights through electronic media, the government should establish an integrated legal cell with the local government.&#x0D; Novelty/Originality of this study: This research contribution in the field of women empowerment that how women can deal with legal advisory, to get jobs, protection in health and institutions.

Advice to use infant formula and free samples are common in both urban and rural areas in China: a cross-sectional survey.

To examine the association between the place of residence and receiving free samples and advice to feed the baby with infant formula. A cross-sectional study. The current study covered twelve counties/districts in China. 5112 mothers with infants aged 0-5·9 months. About 16 % of the mothers received free samples of infant formula. During pregnancy, this likelihood was higher among mothers in small and medium cities (OR: 1·96; 95 % CI 1·14, 3·38) and non-poor rural counties (OR: 4·65; 95 % CI 1·65, 13·14) compared with mothers in big cities. During the hospital stay, it was lower in big cities. After discharge, it was lower in poor rural counties (OR: 0·14; 95 % CI 0·05, 0·41). About 26 % of the mothers were advised to feed their infants with infant formula. The likelihood of receiving advice to feed the baby with infant formula from hospitals was lower in non-poor (OR: 0·37; 95 % CI 0·21, 0·66) and poor rural counties (OR: 0·35; 95 % CI 0·13, 0·91) than in big cities. Mothers in non-poor rural counties were less likely to receive advice from traditional mass media (OR: 0·17; 95 % CI 0·06, 0·48), while mothers in small and medium cities were more likely to receive advice from modern mass media (OR: 1·84; 95 % CI 1·20, 2·80) compared with mothers in big cities. The promotion strategy of infant formula varies from different places of residence in China. The study suggests the need to strengthen enforcement of relevant regulations, especially within health facilities and through modern mass media.

Quality management and user satisfaction of free legal assistance centers Lima

The objective of the study was to establish in what way, the management of the quality of service of the public sector, affect the satisfaction of the users of the free legal assistance centers of the General Directorate of Public Defense and Access to Justice -Lima 2020. It was developed under a mixed approach of non-experimental design, the sample was 298 users who were treated at the Lima free legal assistance center. Finding that, according to 63.8% of users, they have never been able to see that the complaints book is in a visible and accessible place. 46.3% have never noticed improvements in free legal advice services, from their first attention until now. According to users, regarding the time to obtain results in the legal assistance center, those who expressed being among very dissatisfied, dissatisfied, and indifferent, adding up to 61.7%. In the interview, it was found that one of the reasons that negatively influences the performance of defenders, as explained by the administrator, is “excess workload”. The Quality of Services in the Public Sector provided is related to the satisfaction of users in the free legal assistance centers.

Royal Holloway, University of London and the Afghanistan and Central Asian Association: New Partnerships and Challenges During COVID-19 in the Clinical Legal World

&lt;p&gt;In January 2020, Royal Holloway, University of London set up a new Legal Advice Centre offering free legal advice to the local community, including building upon key partnerships to address unmet legal needs. This practice-paper discusses Royal Holloway’s Legal Advice Centre (LAC) and the Afghanistan and Central Asian Association’s (ACCA) collaborative approach and response to the global pandemic since March 2020. It will highlight the unprecedented challenges that they have faced, and their efforts to overcome them. In addition, the paper will discuss their research project, which provides Royal Holloway’s student volunteers with the opportunity to gain unique multidisciplinary understandings of the effect of the pandemic in Afghanistan, and a chance to put their legal skills into practice by producing legal information to support local users of both Royal Holloway’s LAC and the Law Clinic at the ACAA.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;br /&gt;This practice-paper includes a road map to Royal Holloway’s long-term goal, namely, to work with ACAA to research the legal vulnerabilities of women in Afghanistan, with the aid of a research grant supporting international collaboration. Recent reports highlight that lockdown and quarantine measures will have a long-term impact on the basic rights and freedoms of Afghan women, who already face hardship.&lt;/p&gt;