It is considered normal that attorneys have high salaries, because this profession requires serious education and years of experience to become a professional. But the rates are sometimes so high that people with small salaries can’t afford to hire a lawyer. Since the 1970th Legal Aid System is an option available exactly for people with low incomes in Canada.
The whole idea of Legal Aid is actually great, but this type of social help has also some inner problems. There are two types of legal help – the first one is government funded organizations and the second one volunteer lawyers that help people in their free hours. In case of government funded Legal Aid organizations money is the key problem. Government simply can’t provide enough funds to set the satisfying rates for the Legal Aid lawyers. Most of the attorneys naturally would prefer to work for a higher rate. Especially if they just finished an expensive law school and need to star covering the education investments as soon as possible. In the second case the volunteers sometimes simply don’t have enough time to proved qualified help. In some cases the attorney needs weeks of work. Compared to few hours that a lawyer can provide for free it is not enough for any serious help. So in case of volunteer lawyers the help sometimes won’t be very effective. Of course there is also a small number of full time volunteers, lawyers that dedicate their lives to preserve human rights and provide legal help for people with low incomes. But unfortunately modern society makes the life hard for such people.
In some very rare cases lawyers provide their help for free if they will get good publicity from the case. But it happens only when reputation is more important for a lawyer than money. Officially it is called pro bono. In some personal injury cases people can also hire attorneys that work on contingency fee basis, it means that they will receive their money only if the case was at least partly successful. Of course it is not related to Legal Aid system, but it is a good way of getting help if you need some.
Because of underfunding the Legal Aid system already had a major crisis in 2002, today due to the world crisis, when the government has problems in more important spheres, it is hard to imagine what would happen with Legal Aid in future. On the other side the Crisis also brings in a lot of work due to bankruptcies and various stress related problems like divorce and lot of people who have legal problems are also short on money. So the future of Legal Aid system is not very bright. Finding Legal Aid in Canada is very easy, each state has legal Aid agencies that can be found in the Internet or in the golden pages. But if your case is serious you should try to save some money and hire a professional and experienced attorney.
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