We are delighted to invite applications for a new two-year funding programme focussing on supporting access to justice for disabled people.

The 2024 Pro Bono Grants round is now open and will close on Friday 19^th July at 4pm.

Funded largely through income from Pro Bono Costs Orders, donors, and the legal community, the Pro Bono Grants will support advice organisations across the UK to increase access to justice through pro bono provision.

Almost half of all the clients that seek help from the organisations we currently fund report a disability.

Disabled people face substantial barriers to accessing legal advice and these include navigating complex systems such as welfare benefits, mobility issues, living in a rural location and digital exclusion. Furthermore, people with a disability are almost three times as likely to live in material deprivation than the rest of the population, making access to legal advice when it is needed increasingly difficult.

Pro bono costs orders are a powerful tool which solicitors, advocates and litigants in person acting pro bono can use to not only gain justice for their clients but to ensure that many other people gain vital pro bono advice.

We would like to thank all those who successfully applied for pro bono costs orders in the past two years. The funds from pro bono costs and other sources have been pooled to offer this grants round.

We call on the legal community to continue to apply for pro bono costs orders so that we can offer our next Pro Bono Grants round.

We endeavour to provide multi-year funding to empower advice organisations to use our grants to plan and achieve their goals safely in the knowledge that the required funding is in place. We are pleased to offer charities a two-year funding programme.

The link to the application portal, eligibility and guidance criteria is available online here.