Former Chief Justice and Attorney General Roy McMurtry has announced the formation of the "Friends of the Community Legal Clinics." I'm a member of the "Friends" - or a "Friend" of the community legal clinics. The announcement explains what the Friends are about:
R. Roy McMurtry is pleased to announce the formation of the "Friends of the Community Legal Clinics" (The Friends).
The Friends are leaders in Ontario's legal community. The members are:
The Honourable R. Roy McMurtry (Honourary Chair)
Raj Anand
Ron Ellis
Elizabeth Goldberg
Patricia Hughes
Derry Millar
Mary Jane Mossman
Paul Schabas
George Thomson
Fred Zemans
These individuals have come together to form The Friends of the Community Legal Clinics to show their support for Ontario's community clinic system, and to provide the clinic system with advice and guidance, particularly on moving the clinic system forward while preserving the fundamental values that have served their communities well.
The Friends meet on an ad hoc basis, and seek opportunities to engage with relevant organizations to discuss matters pertaining to Ontario's Community Legal Clinics.
The (other) Friends have a long and distinguished history of commitment to access to justice in Ontario. I was pleased to be asked to join the Friends because I've always been an admirer of the community legal clinic system, a distinctive way of delivering individual legal assistance, working with community and law reform all at the same time. And while the LCO as an institution is not a member of the Friends, there are important connections between the work the LCO does and that undertaken by the community clinics. Law reform is the most obvious, even if we come at it differently and with a different emphasis. I also believe that the LCO and the community clinics can help each other achieve our objectives when they overlap. The community clinics (and the other clinics, I want to say here) have been extremely helpful with our projects and some of our projects, I hope, are designed to advance justice for the communities the clinics assist. As an individual, I'm glad to have this other opportunity to work with the issues that have long mattered to me.
