*NEW* National Pro Bono Conference (Montreal, 2012)
Pro Bono Law Alberta, Pro Bono Law of British Columbia, Pro Bono Law Ontario, and Pro Bono Law Saskatchewan hosted the 2nd National Pro Bono Conference at the Wosk Centre for Dialogue in Vancouver, British Columbia on September 18 and 19, 2008. Pro Bono: Spanning the Nation, the 2nd National Pro Bono Conference built on the successes of Building Bridges to Justice, the 1st National Pro Bono Conference held in Toronto in 2006.
This conference brought together legal practitioners, the judiciary, the voluntary sector and academia from Canada, the United States, and abroad to share ideas and best practices in pro bono legal services, to forge new pro bono partnerships, and to explore challenging issues that still lie ahead in the pro bono sphere.
International
*NEW* The Public Interest Law Clearing House ('PILCH') (Australia)
The Public Interest Law Clearing House ('PILCH') is an independent not-for-profit legal referral service.
PILCH seeks to meet the legal needs of community groups, not for profit organisations and individuals from disadvantaged or marginalised backgrounds. PILCH acts as a facilitator for the community to access pro bono legal assistance from the private legal profession. PILCH also engages in targeted law reform and advocacy work, and provides community education and training.
http://www.internationalprobono.com/
This website is a tool created by the International Bar Association to bring together the global community of legal professionals who are involved in pro bono legal work on a local and on an international scale. The site has resources to assist in carrying out pro bono projects as well as articles and news reports on pro bono work around the globe.
LawWorks Million Hours (United Kingdom)
LawWorks is an independent charity with a mission to support, promote and encourage a commitment to pro bono work across the solicitors’ profession. Its aim is to increase the delivery of free legal advice to individuals and communities in need. In order to support this aim, LawWorks has launched a website to record and celebrate the legal pro bono work carried out by lawyers. The site is here and an explanation of the project is here.
National Pro Bono Aspirational Target launched (Australia)
The National Pro Bono Resource Centre has launched the National Pro Bono Aspirational Target. Under the Target, lawyers aspire to do a minimum of 35 hours of pro bono legal work each year. Over 3000 lawyers have already signed up to the Target. The Target enshrines a key ethical value of the legal profession – to provide pro bono legal services to low income, marginalised or disadvantaged people who would otherwise have no other access to legal assistance. For further information see the brochure.
Second National Access to Justice and Pro Bono Conference (Australia)
The second National Access to Justice and Pro Bono Conference 2008 was held in Sydney on 14 and 15 November 2008. The theme for the conference was "Working Together".
Equal Justice Conference (United States)
This annual conference was held in Minneapolis from May 6-9, 2008 and was titled “Pursuing Justice: Balancing Challenges and Opportunities”. The conference brings together all components of the legal community to discuss equal justice issues as they relate to the delivery of legal services to poor and low-income individuals in need of legal assistance. An archive of workshop documents and materials for past Equal Justice conferences are available online here [http://www.abanet.org/legalservices/ejc/archive_workshop_documents.shtml].
