Do your clients have non-legal issues that take your time away from working on their legal matter? Legal Aid Navigators can help.
These LABC staff members guide your clients through the legal aid process and help connect them with the health and social support services they need such as housing, addictions treatment, medical assistance, and more.
Navigators also help clients gather financial and other documentation and assist with anything else needed to improve their legal outcome, such as a bail release plan. In some cases, navigators can provide support in a client’s own language (Arabic, French, Hindi, Punjabi, and Spanish).
If you have a legal aid client who needs extra help, please email navigators@legalaid.bc.ca and include the client’s name and a brief description of what kind of support they’re seeking. A navigator will contact your client and provide you with brief updates.
Legal aid navigators can provide support by:
- Assisting clients in finding housing and addictions treatment
- Offering extra support or advocacy for clients with dual diagnosis mental health and addictions when they could benefit from closer connections to good treatment and recovery programs
- Helping clients apply for income assistance
- Ensuring clients are at court, on time, avoiding bench warrants
- Provide additional support to clients for adhering to bail or sentencing plans and avoiding specific breach conditions
- Helping clients gather required information to prepare for a meeting with you, saving you time
- Supporting clients with electronic document gathering, hard-copy printing and scanning services, and email support, if needed
- Listening to clients for as long as needed and later providing you with a brief update to conserve your contract hours
During the program’s first year, legal aid navigators helped more than 3,500 legal aid clients by:
| Providing warm referrals to services or education about clients’ issues, or accompanying clients to: | Number of times assistance was provided to clients: |
| Addictions services | 152 |
| Bail hearings | 137 |
| Court appearances | 967 |
| Housing services | 684 |
| Lawyer meetings | 1,329 |
| Mental health services | 227 |
| Meetings with navigator and client | 2,800 |
Legal aid lawyer testimonials
“Anytime I reach out to [the Navigator], it’s almost always better for the case in one way or another. [They] give me more information or get the client a certain resource.”
“[Clients] just have so much going on. They’re dealing with poverty, they’re dealing with substances, they’re dealing with mental health struggles. […] People are not even aware of how to look for jobs. […] Same goes for housing or any like mental health services. […] Sometimes they want to talk to me as if I’m their therapist. But I’m not. I’m not trained to give them any therapy. I can listen but I would appreciate if I knew where to send them.”
“If somebody’s got a place to live, it makes a huge difference on a bail hearing. […] It [also] helps tremendously to get people out if there’s an indication that there’s somebody willing to take on a counselling role with him, or just a friendly face to help them get into court.”
“She’s been helpful in tracking down clients. I can go to her and say, ‘[Client X] was supposed to see me. […] I’ve been able to avoid a warrant. But can you ask around?’ She has more time to start canvassing with the local shelters, some of the other resources, and track the client down and say, ‘Get in here.’ That’s been good.”
FAQs
Do navigators match clients with lawyers?
No, we don’t recommend lawyers or match clients with lawyers. We can provide clients with information about how to find a lawyer, but the choice of lawyer remains at the sole discretion of the client.
If my high-needs client dismisses their navigator, will I have to support them on my own?
If a client-navigator relationship breaks down and can’t be repaired, we’ll assign another navigator to assist the client.
What is the difference between a Legal Aid Navigator 1 and Navigator 2?
Navigator 1: provides quick next-step referrals to social supports and legal information.
Navigator 2: provides ongoing case management and support to clients.
Does a Navigator 2 support opposing parties?
No. While providing information and referrals to opposing parties is not a conflict of interest, to prevent any perceived conflict, a Navigator 2 maintain a conflict list that they update monthly. If a conflict does occur, the client is immediately transferred to a different Navigator 2.
What areas of law do navigators help with?
Clients qualify for a navigator based on their need for additional support with legal and social service navigation and referrals, not their legal issue. Any client is eligible for a navigator in Legal Aid BC’s four main areas of law: criminal, family, child protection, and Immigration. Support is provided to clients with full representation contracts, limited representation contracts, and all advice services (Duty Counsel and Family LawLINE).
What if the client needs a lawyer but hasn’t been able to apply for legal aid due to barriers with submitting documents and required paperwork?
We can help! If a client has a legal issue that’s covered but they’re struggling with the application process, navigators can help them with their application.
Do you have questions or feedback on the Legal Aid Navigator program? Email navigators@legalaid.bc.ca and we’ll get back to you. See Legal aid navigators for location information.