Legal Aid Lawyer of the year awards for SLF grantees and expert panel member

The Strategic Legal Fund is delighted to announce that a member of our expert panel, along two of our current grantees, were amongst those honoured at the 2015 Legal Aid Lawyer of the year awards.

Alison Pickup, a barrister at Doughty Street Chambers specialising in immigration, asylum and migrants rights, won legal aid barrister of the year. Alison is also a member of our expert panel which makes recommendations to our funders about individual grant applications and advises on the strategic direction of the SLF.

Two of our current grantees also won awards this year. Public Law Project (PLP), received the evening's top award for Outstanding Achievement, for its role in fighting the legal aid cuts with a series of successful judicial reviews. The SLF grant funded PLP to research the lawfulness or otherwise, of some of the changes introduced under the 2014 Immigration. This includes, among others, the removal of appeal rights for the majority of immigration cases and the power to restrict access to immigration bail in certain circumstances.

Noel Arnold, who is the Director of Legal Practice at Coram Children's Legal Centre (CCLC), was given an award in recognition of the work he undertakes on children rights. The SLF recently provided a grant to CCLC for a third party intervention in two cases being heard in the Court of Appeal relating to the level of support provided by local authorities, (under Section 17 of the Children Act), to destitute migrant families with children.

The SLF would like to congratulate both our expert panel member and our grantees for receiving these prestigious awards.