Welcome and thank you for coming, etc., etc.. My name is Lisa, I’m a lawyer and project coordinator at FLEW, Family Law Education for Women. My co-facilitator this afternoon is Shankari Belendra – let Shankari introduce herself. [Go around room, everyone introduces self, agency, work they do, and BRIEFLY, there goals/objectives in signing up for the session.] I’m not an expert on these 8 legal areas, I’m a facilitator, presenting and facilitating and many of you have a background in these areas. In some cases I have the answers, but these are very specialized areas.
Guidelines: this is not forum to seek individual legal advice for yourself or your client due to time constraints, we will have to keep discussion at high level – no time to probe details and niceties One person speaks at once This is “safe” place for discussion – no question is stupid, don’t criticize
What do we mean by PLE? Vulnerable due to any number of factors such as recent immigration, religion, ethno-cultural factors, language, disability, geographic location, poverty and, in many cases, a combination of these and reasons limiting access
Materials don't read like other PLE materials put out by government agencies. They use very plain language, they include warnings, and they include information that is sometimes difficult for women to hear, but that they are entitled to know.
Outreach and distribution efforts assisted by comprehensive network of community partners that we have built up over the course of the project. We maintain contact list and send out notices when we have new resources or languages available, or where there has been any developments in the law If you would like to be added to our list, please send me an email, or leave me your card after the session today
Springtide – formerly Education Wife Assault
FLEW has developed a large library of public legal education materials for women, to assist them in understanding their rights under Ontario family law.
Series of plain language booklets dealing with 12 key areas under family law:
* = multi-lingual
Point out key tabs – legal info, how to order, specialized materials, language links, asl and dvd links, how to cover tracks
Hello my name is Shankari Balendra and I work as a settlement worker for Access alliance Multicultural Health and Community Services. I assisted in the development f these materials by hosting a focus group to test draft materials and provide feedback on the content as well as quality of the translations. As you all have heard from Lisa, the materials are produced in order to educate community members of legal information and where to get legal advice. As direct service providers we were able to share our experience working with these communities and also to share the dilema of a community member who was confused or misinformed about legal matters. We all know how people who speak English as a second language specially newcomers face problems with legal matters. A visit by a police officer asking about your son or daughter, a knock on the daughter by Children’s Aid Society will bring fear,confusion or to our lives. So these materials are produced to provide information,e ducation and connect to referral sources to get help. When someone comes to our office asking for guidance in dealing with an issue which might need legal services,they want to know the basics of the legal process .Let’s say a refugee claimant wants to know what steps he can take in case if his refugee claim was rejected.Am I eligible to do something,what is an appeal,What is a Humanitarion and compasionate application ?will I be able to get legal aid? How long it will take? Can I represent myself for the hearing..Imagine a newcomer family’s dilema dealing with Children’s Aid Society..as frontline workers if we can make these materials available for our clients,if we can give information in their own language or if we can make these materials available for our clients we will be providing effective services for our clients.
We all do workshops or information sessions for our clients.At Access Alliance we do health education workshops in LINC classes.You all may have information sessions.These materials can be placed at a location visible for the clients,or the presenter can introduce the brochures,audio pieces,and inform to clients that these are available in many different languages.
If you have a resource centre in our organization these materials can be ordered and arranged on the stand which also can be ordered.
If your organization is having a community event like a community BBQ, a open house,youth night,cooking program,support group,conversation circle we can arrange the materials to be available for clients.A service provider can use a table with these legal information materials and be there to answer any questions. Usually these programs are planned to have each topic for every sessions.For one session the presenter can arrange for this FLEW materials or Your Rights Your language materials and discuss and share information with group participants. Specially for those who have English conversation circle can select a session to talk about legal information and share their experience dealing with legal information and later the information materials can be shared with the group.
Note that local clinics often have lists of local family law lawyers
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