Talk:Legal Aid Ontario

Updating information?
I'm interested in helping clean up this article, i.e. so that it has verifiable citations, is no longer a stub and is similar in content to other government of Ontario pages. Regarding me, I am indeed an employee of Legal Aid Ontario (please see my user page) but I'm hoping that some fellow Wikipedians will be able to assist with peer-editing some content I have drafted. Transparency is the #1 thing here. People should know who I represent, but that should not restrict me from updating information that is almost three years old. I really would like to get some discussions going about where this project can lead. The last thing I want to do is add information to the article before it's been reviewed extensively.

I added the Ontario Wikiproject flags so that I could get some attention to this page and because Legal Aid Ontario is a provincial organization, not Toronto-specific. I think that should be reflected in terms of the Wikiprojects.

Thanks everyone!

Lawyer in training (talk) 14:58, 28 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Law isn't my area of knowledge, so I can't contribute too much to this, but to expand the article I looked at other legal aid articles, such as Legal aid in the United States as a template. Dividing the article into sections is always a good place to start as it gives editors a framework to expand. So a section on history may be rather short at first but there would be a clear direction to go for future editors. As well, further sources will be needed from both the press and more specialized sources. I'm not certain what kind of coverage legal aid in Ontario gets but I'm wondering if there are some key instances of cases that could be included to illustrate how legal aid works in Ontario. I'll give it some more thought and see what else could be added--I just stumbled across this and saw no one had responded, so I thought I'd add a quick note.  freshacconci  talk talk  12:13, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

My thoughts
Was asked to provide some opinions here, so I'll do the best I can.
 * This sentence: "Through a toll-free number and multiple in-person locations such as courthouse offices, duty counsel and community clinics, the organization provides legal assistance to a million low-income Ontario residents each year.", strikes me as a bit of peacocking, since it looks like it wouldn't be out of place in a glossy brochure explaining why you should donate to the organization. Could probably be toned down a bit.
 * The "About the organization" heading looks, again, like something that would appear in a brochure (and shouldn't the whole article be about the organization, anyway?) I think a header like "Organizational scope" or the like might work better. The section itself, however, is written quite well. I made a few copyedits.
 * The "Aboriginal legal rights" header explains its subject clearly, but to me, fails to tie it to the organization. Does the organization help in cases like these? If this is a major focus of the organization, it should be explained how it focuses particularly on this area. If it's just one more area it covers, "aboriginal law" should just be placed as another item in the preceding section (along with domestic violence, etc.), with of course a wikilink to the appropriate article on Canadian aboriginal law for context.
 * Removed the section as I cannot understand how it ties into the organization either. Alan.ca (talk) 06:05, 25 October 2010 (UTC)


 * The "clinics" section should specify what the clinics are and what their purpose is in the first paragraph of the section, if not the first sentence. When I think of clinics, my first thought is immediately of a medical facility.
 * The "specialty clinics" section is unreferenced, and probably could do with a few (for example, what is meant by "typically" providing aid in the given circumstances?) Also, I'm not clear from it on the relationship of SLASS to Legal Aid Ontario&mdash;is it an arm of Legal Aid Ontario, a separate organization that works closely with it, a spinoff that's now independent? It just seems to be brought up, with no context provided to say what it actually is or how it's related.
 * The "History of Legal Aid in Ontario" section covers a lot of things that don't have any tie to the current Legal Aid Ontario, or at least don't explain how the event ties in. I'd encourage, instead of splitting sections by decade, to write this as continuous prose, specifying only the parts of Ontario's history of legal aid that relate to this particular organization, and explaining how and why those parts affected it. The rest should be left out&mdash;having parts that show no relevance to the article's subject is confusing, and seems to be a jump to a different topic.
 * The "Recent years" heading should also be removed, and that section reformulated to prose using "2010" or the like, rather than "recent". We shouldn't assume an article will be read in the current time frame, but should always specify what time we're talking about in absolute terms so that the article will be accurate even when "2010" isn't so recent anymore. Using relative time frames would mean an article would appear inaccurate or dated if read several years later.
 * I'm not sure what listing the organization's entire group of current and past officers adds to the article. If any of those officers are noted in a source as particularly critical to the organization, a section on them should focus on those specific people and why the source considers them particularly important. Otherwise, I don't see the need to list them at all.
 * Agreed, removed this section. Alan.ca (talk) 06:05, 25 October 2010 (UTC)

So, in conclusion, while this is not the actual GA review, I don't see a GA here right now. I think, however, that the potential exists here, if the flow, tone, original research, and NPOV issues can be corrected, and that's certainly something that can be done. Seraphimblade Talk to me 05:47, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Some of the sources do not support the point being made. For example, this sentence: "In 1967, modeled on similar doctrines in England and Scotland..." cites this source: . That source doesn't even mention Ontario, let alone that the laws are similar. Therefore, that sentence is synthesis, and is not source-based. To say that one doctrine is based upon the other requires a source specifically saying "X was based upon Y", not an editor concluding it is so.

Removed section - content may be useful?
I removed the following section from this article, however the content is well referenced and may be useful elsewhere? Alan.ca (talk) 05:50, 25 October 2010 (UTC)

Aboriginal legal rights
Section 35 of the Constitution Act of 1982 recognizes and affirms the existence of aboriginal rights in Canada and the definition of "Aboriginal Peoples of Canada" to include Indian, Inuit and Métis peoples of Canada.

Self-identifying individuals that are of aboriginal ancestry can receive additional legal assistance, and have their cases heard in Gladue court, which takes an individual's aboriginal background into account when imposing sentences. As sections of the Criminal Code, the Youth Criminal Justice Act and the Child and Family Service Act have components that deal with the unique legal status of Aboriginal people in Canada, self-identifying First Nations people may benefit from these amendments.

Helping with recommended edits
I'm really glad to see that the article has got some traction and criticism! I would really like to help with the editing of the piece, but at this stage of development, I’m a bit hesitant if I should be involved in it or not due to COI. Perhaps I can assist with providing further information on certain components?


 * Regarding the aboriginal context, perhaps inserting it into this sentence after refugee and immigration hearings and linking to the article on Section 35 (aboriginal rights) will suffice? LAO does provide additional services to individuals that self-identify as Aboriginal and the organization has been working on improving legal representation for aboriginal clients and reducing barriers to justice.

“Legal issues that are covered by Legal Aid Ontario include matters involving domestic violence, family law, child custody, refugee and immigration hearings, (aboriginal specific legal matters) and poverty law”


 * I agree that the lead for the clinics section can be cleaned up. Perhaps removing the Community Clinics subhead and merging sentence below with the one above will address this problem?

"A major component of Legal Aid Ontario’s services are provided through the 77 community clinics[3] (62 community clinics, 15 specialty clinics) [4] and six Student Legal Aid Services Societies[5] located throughout the province. Funded by Legal Aid Ontario, these organizations provide legal advice, and in some cases representation, primarily for civil law matters. While social assistance and housing law are two key areas community clinics assist with, clinics tailor their services offered for the geographic location from which they operate. Services that are provided by the community clinics may include:"


 * SLASS are part of LAO in that they receive their funding from us and from the university. The purpose of SLASS is to allow law students hands-on experience with legal work. They operate in the same fashion as our community clinics (both specialty and general ones).
 * I can have the tags on the logo updated. What exactly would I need to provide to bring it up to wikipedia standards?

Lawyer in training (talk) 13:34, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Assessment
I have upped the quality rating of this article from stub to C. It should be checked against the B-Class criteria. 20:26, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Clean up
I've done a pretty significant clean up of the page as it hasn't been updated in a while. The changes include updated financial and legal help eligibility information and more recent historical and criticism. I've also tried to simplify and improve the general writing of the page as a whole. Would appreciate any feedback and or edits. Thanks! Lawyer in training (talk) 15:34, 27 December 2017 (UTC)