The Law Foundation of BC is now in its third year of creating funding specifically aimed at addressing systemic inequities and access barriers that exist within the justice system.

One program that the Foundation has been proud to fund through its racial justice funding initiative is the South Asian Legal Clinic of BC, which provides low-barrier, multilingual and culturally sensitive legal information, education, advice and advocacy to South Asian people in B.C. It began as a project in 2017-18, when a group of South Asian lawyers brought the community together to research the community’s legal needs with a goal of finding a way to meet these needs based on the principle of enhancing community capacity, without duplicating existing services. After piloting the service for several years, principally as a volunteer exercise, the Foundation provided core funding for the clinic to hire lawyers and staff full-time. They now have seven staff, including three lawyers and two community advocates.

Providing support to develop and operate legal infrastructure to meet the unique needs of under-served communities is an important access to justice aim of the Foundation, and we look forward to expanding funding for these kinds of services in the years to come.