Our Social Impact: Levelling the playing field
The uncertain macro-economic backdrop and cost of living crisis continue to weigh on the global and local communities in which we operate and has reaffirmed our responsibility as a business to help level the playing field.
We take a strategic approach, leveraging our professional skills and partnerships with charities and non-profit organisations to support them with cost-relieving projects and putting our resources and expertise at their disposal.
A key focus of our Social Impact programme is the work we do with the charity partners of the Charles Russell Speechlys Foundation—and in the current climate, this is more important than ever.
In the following pages, you can read more about the multi-layered approach these partnerships take and the help we have been able to provide to build their capacity and ability to deliver for their beneficiaries through pro bono advice, skills sharing and other in kind support. Over the past two years, a particular priority has been building opportunities for our business services colleagues to lend their experience to our charity partners.
Our varied and growing pro bono practice continues to focus on access to justice, and our Legal Advice Clinics and Windrush Legal Initiative are just two of the highlights from this area over the last 12 months.
In addition, our flagship social mobility outreach programme, Career Start, has continued to go from strength to strength and, along with insight days run throughout the year for young people, aims to widen access to the legal profession.
We have been working hard to increase awareness of the opportunities available to our people to give their time, share their skills and support our charity partners and individuals. We are seeing encouraging progress in this space: the total number of hours our people gave through pro bono advice and community investment volunteering increased in 2022/23, as did the total number of people giving their time, compared to 2021/22.
Crunching the numbers 2022/23
Community investment
Community Investment volunteers
Community Investment (non-legal) volunteer hours
of our people in the UK giving their time to Community Investment activities
Impact - Community investment
key charity partners of the CRS Foundation provided with capacity building professional skills support including:
- Design expertise
- Social media and marketing advice
- CRM system advice
- Cyber security support
- Video conferencing system advice
young people provided with mentoring
young people completed work experience
young people attended insight days
of young people participating in mentoring, work experience and insight days increased their understanding and awareness of careers in law
Pro bono
Pro bono
pro bono hours
average pro bono hours per lawyer
fee-equivalent value for pro bono work
lawyers
of UK lawyers participating in pro bono work
Impact - Pro bono
non-profit organisations provided with pro bono legal advice on legal issues including:
Corporate, Commercial, Real Estate, Employment, Tax, Trusts & Succession, Charities, Immigration, Intellectual Property, Data Protection and Construction
individuals supported with pro bono legal advice through:
- Family, Employment, and Social Housing law legal advice clinics
- The Windrush Legal Initiative
- The European Lawyers in Lesvos secondment
- Disability Benefit Appeals
Alumni • Legal Notices • Accessibility • Privacy Notice • Fraudulent or 'scam' communication • Complaints Procedure • COVID Secure Certification • Pricing Information
© Charles Russell Speechlys 2024. Solicitors Regulation Authority number 420625.