Legal Eagles Give Back to Local Communities

Lawyers and others in the legal community from across the North East and Yorkshire are proud to have raised over £9,000 in their first year after establishing a legal advice trust – they are hoping to beat the target this year. In July 2009, following examples in London, Manchester and the Midlands, lawyers set up the North East Legal Support Trust (NELST) to improve the availability of access to legal services for local advice agencies. This year they have raised a total of £9,249 through a series of annual sponsored walks held in the major cities covered by the Trust. Already the Trust has received high levels of support on walks held in Leeds and now the trustees aim to repeat this for 2010 with sponsored 10K walks in Newcastle, Leeds and Sheffield on September 30th and a further walk in Hull. Sarah Brumpton from Irwin Mitchell was one of the trustees who helped set up the initiative, she said: “Lots of people in the region need advice on legal matters but often don’t have the access they need. Advice centres sometimes have very limited funding from local authorities which leaves some bodies struggling. The North East Legal Support Trust can help by raising funds and distributing them to those advice centres which really need it to give the benefits to the local people who use the centres. “We want as many people to get involved in the 10K sponsored walks on the 30th September and also help us in raising as much money as possible this year so that we can beat last years target.” The founding Trustees for NELST are Sarah Brumpton (Irwin Mitchell), Paul McKeown (Northumbria University), Claire Daniel (BPP, Leeds), Roger Halson (Leeds University) and Lindsay Ward (College of Law, York) with new Trustees joining from Hull, Frank Dignan (Hull University) and Sheffield, Anna Deans (Sheffield Hallam University). To register a team for the walk or to find out more email enquiries@nelst.org.uk or log on to www.nelst.org.uk

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