Sector experts come together at ASA-LLST event

More than 40 advice sector experts joined us for the first ever “Building a more sustainable advice workforce” event, held at Simmons & Simmons LLP and online on Wednesday 12 June.

Jointly organised by Advice Services Alliance and London Legal Support Trust as part of the Advice Workforce Development Fund programme, the event was an opportunity to bring the advice sector across England and Wales together and kick-start the conversation on addressing some of the sector’s biggest challenges to recruitment, retention, training and progression at the moment.

The Fund’s senior programme manager Chris Scutt said, “We were delighted by the sheer energy that people brought to the event, and wanted to thank everybody who joined us.  Whether you’re in Wales, or Manchester, London or elsewhere, this event showed the hunger that exists to create a more sustainable advice workforce, which will ensure the sector is there for people in their times of need”.

The event included two panel discussions, chaired by Sue James (of Legal Action Group), and Sioned Churchill (formerly of Trust for London, and now working with LLST as an adviser to the Advice Workforce programme).  The first panel, which included Alan Markey of Coventry Independent Advice Service (and Chair of NAWRA), Victoria Speed of the Employment Legal Advice Network, and Matthew Howgate of the Legal Aid Practitioners Group, spoke to the practical and real-world challenges to advice workforce development.

Alan asked if there was an identity crisis within the sector these days: were we still attractive to today’s students?  Victoria spoke of challenges from an employment advice perspective, including the loss of experienced people to other sectors and the knock-on effects for supervision; while Matthew highlighted the challenges of management and leadership, including “accidental managers”, who faced a lack of: (a) time to think; (b) money to deal with the many and complex challenges facing them; (c) management skill; and (d) shared learning and partnership.

The second panel, consisting of Gareth Morgan of Ferret Information Systems (who outlined the excellent Dangos project in Wales), Zoe Bantleman of Immigration Lawyers’ Practitioners’ Association (ILPA), and Dan Manville of Greater Manchester Law Centre (GMLC), generated insights and conversation on strategies and solutions for the future.

Dan, for example, shared GMLC’s model, which welcomes cohorts of law and bar students each year to the Law Centre’s advocacy project.  The students work together on WCA and PIP appeals, and the training they receive enables them to present welfare rights cases at tribunal; there is a strong social element built into the project.

And Nezahat Cihan, LLST’s chief executive, spoke of the collaborative work being done in London, thanks to the Propel funding programme, to make recruitment, retention and progression pathways into the advice sector as inclusive and sustainable as possible.

“This first event rightly afforded considerable time to the existing challenges facing us within the sector, but it was equally fantastic to hear some of the innovative solutions being tried and tested across England and Wales.  Working with our partners, we’re fully expecting to make this event a recurring feature of the advice sector’s calendar in the time to come”.