LEGAL AID DENIED Women and the Cuts to Legal Services in BC By Alison Brewin With Lindsay Stephens SEPTEMBER 2004 Legal Aid Denied: Women and the Cuts to Legal Services in BC By Alison Brewin With Lindsay Stephens September 2004 ABOUT THE AUTHORS Alison Brewin is the Program Director at West Coast LEAF, managing the law reform, litigation and public legal education work of the organization. [...] Recommendations for the government to redress this situation include: ensure funding for legal aid goes directly to legal aid services; eliminate the requirement that violence be present in the eligibility rules for family law legal aid; restructure the LSS Board to re-establish an arms length relationship between the government and the Society; and provide civil law legal aid services according t [...] In addition to legal aid, some of the changes include: • The elimination of the Ministry of Women's Equality; • The end of the universal daycare program that had begun to be implemented by the previous provincial government; • Cuts in accessibility to child care subsidies; • Elimination of the Human Rights Commission; • End to funding for women's centres; • Cuts and changes to welfare rules, inclu [...] The Charter not only includes Section 11's statements about the right to a fair trial: it also includes statements about rights to life, liberty and security of the person (Section 7); assurances that every one is equal before the law and has the right to equal protection of the law (Section 15); and guarantees that the fundamental rights outlined in the Charter must apply equally to men and women [...] Women and Poverty and Immigration Law Services Poverty Law Services Poverty law is the one area of law defined by the income level of the individual, not the subject matter of the legal problem.