A woman on a temporary student visa comes to Canada to study. During her time here, she has a baby with her new boyfriend. But the boyfriend becomes abusive – she wants to leave him and return with her child to her original country. Can she do this? What are her legal rights? As a service provider, how would you begin to direct her to the help she needs?

One of Clicklaw’s newer contributors, the YWCA Vancouver, tackles this complex issue with a project funded by the Law Foundation of BC called the Mothers Without Status Legal Project. “Mothers without status” refers to single women with children living in Canada, who are neither Canadian citizens nor permanent residents. Many of these women have fled their relationship because of abuse.

During the course of this project, staff interviewed almost two dozen women in this type of situation to get a full picture of the multiple challenges they face. As a result of these interviews, the YWCA identified the need for a new resource, and published a booklet called Mothers Without Status: Practical information for service providers working with women who have no legal status. This 26-page booklet provides practical legal information on how service providers can help these women to navigate the immigration and family law systems in Canada.

The YWCA will be publishing the full results of their research project within the next few months – look for it on Clicklaw in the Reform & Research section.

More resources relating to the new court rules for family law cases in Supreme Court are now available on Clicklaw. As of July 1, family law cases in Supreme Court have to use new forms and follow new processes. The Legal Services Society has now added to Clicklaw the fact sheet Going to Supreme Court? Read this first!, which points to all the resources on the Family Law in BC website that can help you get started with the new forms and processes.

As well, from Clicklaw you can directly access such new Legal Services Society resources as:

• Self-help guides on How to fill out a Notice of Family Claim (Form F3) and How to deal with a Supreme Court Financial Statement (Form F8).
• How to Use the New Supreme Court Family Forms, a 10-minute video that describes how to open, fill out, and save the most complicated of the new Supreme Court forms.
• Sample completed Supreme Court forms page, a page of links to sample completed Supreme Court family forms on JP Boyd’s BC Family Law Resource website.

Speaking of JP Boyd’s website, we admire it so much that we’ve added entries on Clicklaw for JP Boyd’s BC Family Law Resource as well as New Rules 101: An Introduction, a section explaining the procedure and forms under the new court rules.

Tags: new court forms, new court rules

Did you know that if you do nothing but deposit a $250 GST cheque each year into a Registered Disability Savings Plan, starting when you’re 32, by the time you are 60, the value of an RDSP should be over $100,000?

As explained in a new guide, overview, and video series from the BC Coalition of People with Disabilities, this is the power of the Registered Disability Savings Plan. Introduced by the federal government in 2007, RDSPs are a long-term savings program for people with disabilities.

With funding from the Law Foundation of BC, the BC Coalition of People with Disabilities created these new resources to explain:

• who is likely to qualify for an RDSP
• the importance of the Disability Tax Credit
• how to get money in and out of an RDSP, including applying for grants and bonds
• why people with disabilities should open an RDSP, even if they have a low income
• what people with disabilities on social assistance need to know

In addition to these resources, the BC Coalition of People with Disabilities produces a series of fact sheets for people with disabilities on a range of legal topics. For more information on these and other great legal resources for people in BC, visit Clicklaw.

More resources to navigate the new court rules for Supreme Court cases are now availble on Clicklaw. The Justice Education Society has updated and expanded its excellent Supreme Court Self-Help Guidebook series.

The series includes over 20 guidebooks written in plain language for those who are representing themselves in BC Supreme Court. The guidebooks fully incorporate the court rules that took effect on July 1, 2010, and include court forms with annotations explaining key parts of each form.

We admire these guidebooks so much that we’ve featured them in a new common question, “I’m trying to prepare a case under the new Supreme Court rules“. The guidebook series has been expanded to now include guidebooks on the transition to the new court rules and drafting orders in Supreme Court.

The Justice Education Society has also launched the website SupremeCourtBC.ca, which brings together a number of the Society’s videos, web resources and publications dealing with the Supreme Court. Along with the new guidebooks, the site is the new home to the videos Court Tips for Parents and Family Law and You: Representing Yourself in BC Supreme Court, the multimedia presentations Taking Your Case to Supreme Court, and more.

Tags: new court forms, new court rules

New court rules and forms for Supreme Court cases came into effect on July 1, 2010. We’ve posted a series of common questions on Clicklaw:

• Where can I find the new court rules and forms for Supreme Court cases?
• Can I fill in the new court forms online?
• I started a Supreme Court case before July 1, 2010. Will the new rules affect me?

Additional resources will be available through Clicklaw in the days ahead, including updated guidebooks from Justice Education Society and updated resources on the Family Law Website from Legal Services Society.

Tags: new court forms, new court rules

People’s Law School has updated its booklet Human Trafficking in Canada. This 16-page booklet is for community workers, teachers and others who want to help their communities learn more about human trafficking. The booklet explains what human trafficking is, what the law says about it, and what you can do. New with this second edition are warning signs indicating that someone may be a trafficked person, may be living in domestic servitude, or is being sexually exploited.

Now open for business, the Vancouver Justice Access Centre provides legal help for people with family law issues such as separation, divorce, child support and custody. In addition to family law services, the Centre also provides legal services for civil law issues such as debt, employment, benefits and housing. Within the Centre, there is a Self-Help Information Service, where people who are representing themselves in Supreme Court matters can get assistance. For more information about these and other legal services in your community, check out Clicklaw’s HelpMap.

Tags: HelpMap

Welcome to the Nidus Personal Planning Resource Centre and Registry,  a new contributor to the Clicklaw website. Their resources provide great information on representation agreements – legal documents that allow you to name someone to act on your behalf for health and personal care matters. Nidus resources in the Solve Problems section of Clicklaw include factsheets, checklists and worksheets that can help you to create and register a representation agreement that best suits your needs and beliefs.

Nidus also has information specific to people with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder, including a report in Clicklaw’s Reform and Research section called “Experiences of Adults Living with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder and Their Personal Supporters in Making and Using a Representation Agreement”

In 2009, West Coast LEAF’s Family Law Project identified the need for capturing a snapshot of the existing legal resources for women in BC. Project staff conducted a survey of advocacy groups and women-serving community based organizations, and released a report recently added to the Reform and Research section of Clicklaw:  Mapping the Gap: A Summary of Legal Resources for Women in British Columbia.

The report includes findings concerning gaps in legal information and resources for women, significant challenges with legal aid, and rural realities.

• Legal Services Society published an article in their newsletter Elan summarizing changes made to welfare benefits in recent months. The most recent edition of Your Welfare Rights: A Guide to BC Employment and Assistance is available on Clicklaw, and Legal Services Society is preparing an insert of updated information.
• Among the changes that came into effect on June 1, 2010 are new rules about welfare eligibility for people who have outstanding arrest warrants. Rebecca Cuttler interviews Pivot Legal Society lawyer Doug King in the podcast New Provincial Law Bans Social Assistance for People with Warrants.
• Earlier this year, major changes came into effect relating to coverage for health supplements for those on welfare. The BC Coalition of People with Disabilities has updated the help sheet Health Supplements for People with Disabilities, which summarizes the current range of medical services and supplies provided by the BC Ministry of Housing and Social Development.