The Queen's Family Law Clinic assists self-representing Family Court litigants by completing their documents, helping them negotiate the Family Court process and referring them to other family justice resources.
The Queen's Family Law Clinic assists self-representing Family Court litigants by completing their documents, helping them negotiate the Family Court process and referring them to other family justice resources.

For the Queen’s Law Clinics in downtown Kingston, early April brought more than showers – the first breaths of spring were accompanied by welcome news from Legal Aid Ontario (LAO).

As part of a province-wide investment from LAO to expand clinic law services for low-income Ontarians, the Queen’s Law Clinics will receive an additional allocation of $100,000 – in addition to existing LAO funding and faculty support – to their base annual funding, in order to maintain family law services.

As explained by the Clinics’ Executive Director, Karla McGrath, LLM'13, the timing of the funding couldn’t be better for its new and innovative Family Law Clinic. “In 2014, with funds provided by Legal Aid Ontario, Queen’s was able to expand its experiential learning and local services with the addition of the Queen’s Family Law Clinic,” she says. 

“Following the expiration of the three-year Family Law funding package in 2017, the Queen’s Faculty of Law continued the operation of the QFLC while seeking long-term funding options.  Although there had been no reduction in service to date, we were projecting a reduction in those services if new funding was not secured.”

The new funding package from LAO means local residents with low incomes can continue to rely on the Family Law Clinic to help them with the complex paperwork and other tasks that are associated with self-representation at family court. Areas that the Family Law Clinic assist with include custody, access, child support, enforcement of support and divorce. “With this proposed $100,000 increase in core funding, we will be in a position to continue to provide Family Law services at current levels and will do so without interruption,” McGrath says.

The dual role of the Clinics – both as a place for Queen’s Law students to build skills and learn the value of pro bono work, and a source of much-needed legal aid for local residents with low incomes – will be well served by the LAO funding, McGrath says. “We are proud of and grateful for our excellent working relationship with Legal Aid Ontario and we look forward to continuing to work together to provide training for our law students in a public service model and quality legal services for vulnerable members of the Kingston community.”

The Queen’s Law Clinics includes the Business Law Clinic, the Elder Law Clinic, the Family Law Clinic, the Prison Law Clinic and Queen’s Legal Aid.  Each year the Clinics provide 185 volunteer, credit and summer student caseworker positions to first, second and third year law students.  Working under the close supervision of clinic lawyers, the students provide clients in Kingston and the surrounding area with legal assistance in business, elder, family, poverty and prison law matters.