Working to protect your legal rights
Main Phone : 01246 550 674
Main MenuDerbyshire Law Centre (DLC) has welcomed Matthew Brown as a new housing solicitor. Matt originally joined the Law Centre over 5 years ago, starting with a 12-week placement as a volunteer while at university. We interviewed Matt to ask him about what drew him to the Law Centres movement and how he has found his way to becoming a newly qualified solicitor.
On Monday 6th December everyone is invited to attend our launch to celebrate our new exciting service: Housing Repair Support service.
Thanks to generous funding from Bolsover District Council, Chesterfield Borough Council, and North East Derbyshire District Council, their residents will be able to get free advice to address disrepairs in their rented homes.
Well done to our debt advisers Sue and Sally for passing the latest Debt Advice Peer Assessment with an incredible 98% score!
We are so proud of the quality of debt advice we give our clients at Derbyshire Law Centre.
If you need free, impartial debt advice, then get in touch today.
We just wanted to share about an amazing result this morning. As soon our reception was open at 9:30am today was a Council tenant contacted to say that they were being evicted at 11:30am this morning. Matt Brown, a Solicitor, took some instructions from the tenant over the phone before Luke Ridge, a Housing caseworker, dashed off to their house in Derbyshire to check the paperwork. Luke spotted an error and rushed back to Court whilst Matt rang ahead to alert them that we needed to make an application at the last minute.
Derbyshire Law Centre’s Housing Legal Team have passed their Independent Housing Review of their cases.
The reviewer, commissioned by the Legal Aid Agency said, “Most of the Law Centre’s files demonstrated good, clear, effective, tailored advice and casework. Where appropriate, advisors were prepared to attend local authority possession/tenancy review hearings and attend court under the representation at court scheme”.
Teresa Waldron, who is deafblind, works part-time as one of the senior managers at Derbyshire Law Centre and is also Managing Director of Deaf-initely Women. Here on BBC Women’s Hour she applauded Rose Ayling-Ellis, a Deaf Actor and contestant in Strictly Come Dancing for being a role model for deaf people, breaking down barriers.. Teresa resonated with Rose, like her as she is also proud to be deaf. Teresa said “I have worked at the Law Centre for 27 years now and I remember being diagn0osed in 2003 for having Ushers Syndrome which meant I had to give up driving. My colleagues were and continues to be supportive of me as my sight has deteriorated.”
We are very proud to share the news of the work we have done in the last 12 months. Click here to read more about the challenges that we all had to overcome to keep our services open throughout the pandemic.
With funding from Community Justice Fund that we have received during the pandemic, we have indeed made a huge difference to people’s lives in Derbyshire. Together, we have supported 483,000 clients a year and helped the Treasury to save £8000 per person assisted. This equates to a net benefit to the public purse of £4billion per year!
Contact us now if you need FREE help and advice with managing your budget or debts.
Thanks to Bolsover District Council, they have invited Derbyshire Law Centre to take part in Bolsover TV.
Lisa Haythorne, a Housing Solicitor, has kindly accepted their invitation to talk about how the pandemic has affected our clients in struggling to pay their rent or mortgage and what we have been doing to help them stay in their own homes.
Watch the video – Lisa Haythorne is on at three minutes in.
